Monthly Archives: October 2006

Health

Trick or Treat?

Last year, I was propped up on a chair on the porch with a bag of candy on my lap and a walker in front of me, sort of like a shield.  I was in a great deal of pain – despite the muscle relaxants and pain medication that I finally agreed to take.  I wonder now if the kids coming for candy thought I was in some weird costume or something.

Let’s just keep it simple for now and say that I have had a “bad back” for a long time.  Four days prior to Halloween in 2005 took it to a whole different level though.  I had been used to rather constant pain for years.  I had known, if you will, what it was like to have muscles spasm.  That particular morning though, when my back seized up so abruptly that I hit the floor face first, I thought I was going to die.  The pain was so excruciating I cannot even really describe it.  I was paralyzed, for the most part, on the bathroom floor.  I will spare you the details of how long it took and how messed up it was to crawl (sort of) and maneuver myself to a phone.

In fact, I am not sure that I am even ready to go back and read journal entries from this event.  I certainly am not motivated to remember it all right now.

I can give you a few highlights… about how my friend Christopher came over and helped me get dressed; and my chiropractor and acupuncture person both came to my house and worked on me; about how I was unable to walk on my own for days; about how Trudy had to set an alarm for every 2-3 hours throughout the nights to wake me up and literally flip my body over so that I wouldn’t cramp up (more) being in the same position too long; or how she had to help me do any and all self-care for those first few days.  I could share that my friend Boyer brought me the walker – which I was strong enough to use by Halloween day – to get from the “Recovery Room” to the porch to hand out candy.

I made incremental improvement each day and was able to graduate to the cane instead of the walker by that next week.  Even though I am not truly prepared to go back to that time and share more details, what amazes me and made me want to acknowledge this time frame is that I honestly did not know a year ago if I would ever be able to walk again.  I was terrified that I was officially ‘broken’ enough that my body was done.

I am not up for sharing all of the details of the recovery work in the last year.

I will share with you that I am so grateful for the people that helped along the way.  My amazement never ceases at what love and faith can do for a person.

I am free of the need for the support of the cane for months now.  I go for a walk nearly every day – partially because I know it is key to relieving my pain, stretching my muscles out, and building back strength.  But mostly I walk now – because I can.

This year for Halloween, when the kids showed up for candy, I could actually stand up and greet them. 

I am grateful for this anniversary of sorts.  And grateful for everyone who has had a part in the process of getting my back – back on track…

Sex

Darth Vader

We went to a Halloween party Friday night.  We got invited months ago.  A friend of mine was the host/party planner.  It was a fundraiser for a good cause and I wanted to support her hard work.  However, I was anxious, like normal, about going to an event with a lot of people, most of whom would be strangers.  Then it occurred to me that I could wear a mask and nobody would be able to look at me. 

If they can’t see my face or my body then they can’t judge whether or not they think I am male or female.  If they aren’t trying to make that judgment – they won’t have to react awkwardly or negatively towards me if they think I am not conforming to my given gender appropriately enough for their standards.

Even though I “knew” that having a costume on would be safer for me; I was pleasantly surprised at how true this actually was.  Right away, walking in the door, instead of the usual questioning and potentially judgmental looks, nobody batted an eye that Darth Vader was walking in.

I was fully dressed in black.  I had on black boots, black pants, a black turtle neck and button down shirt, and a thin black stocking cap on.  The Darth Vader mask covered my face.  My black cloak with the hood up finished off the outfit of darkness.  I really felt like I had an ‘invisibility cloak’ covering me.  Granted, I was noticed walking through the crowd – but not for the same reasons as normal.

Interestingly enough though, the costume caused other problems.  Like, I could hardly see out of the eye area on the mask, everything was a blur.  I noticed eventually that my hearing was also impaired with the mask on.  So I was able to walk around and not have to worry about people’s reactions to my lack of gender congruity – the only problem was that I had to walk around worried that I would run into someone and that I couldn’t understand what anyone said to me.

All the more reason to stand pretty much in one place.  We found a couple of our friends.  Feeling safe enough around the people I knew, I was able to lift my mask and see and hear them while we chatted.  I have to admit though that it was highly comforting to know and be able to flip the mask down anytime a stranger approached.

With my costume on, I was able to simply be part of the crowd.  I was one of the many who had put time and energy into a costume.  I was one of the many who were enjoying taking on a different persona for the evening.  I was a recognizable character.  Even though I was “scary” looking given who I was representing… I was just part of the crowd.  I was not a threat to anyone’s reality of how men and women are supposed to act or behave.

Besides, Halloween had the added bonus that it is certainly a holiday that it is acceptable to play the part of the opposite gender without warranting a negative reaction.  Not only would people assume I was a man in my Darth costume, they would not freak out if they found out I was a woman instead.

Boys can dress like girls on Halloween.  Girls can dress like boys on Halloween.

Wollner can fit in amongst strangers on Halloween.

 And carry a light saber…

Sex

“Sir” Saturday_100706

I woke up on Saturday morning and oriented myself as much as possible, walking carefully on the unfamiliar carpet of the hotel floor, hoping not to run into the desk or anything.  My feet hit the colder tile floor in the bathroom and I made my way to the toilet.  That is when I opened my eyes.  The lights were out but some sun was sneaking into the room enough that I was able to see one of the hotel glasses on the floor in front of me, upside down.   It was too dark to make out what or if there was something inside of the glass.  I saw a blurr but couldn’t tell what I was seeing.  My brain was swirling around slowly with thoughts about the happy hour from the previous night and what I wanted to do with myself for the day.  Mostly though, I was excited to crawl back into the king size bed and watch TV.  Trudy was working and I was alone for the day.  Or so I thought.  I got up and, while I washed my hands, I noticed a note from Trudy.  She wrote “Don’t let the cockroach out!  I want management to see this thing!”  Sure enough, with the light on, I could see the cockroach.  It was magnified somewhat by the clear glass it was trapped under, and it was huge.  It was at least two inches in length, and pretty thick.  I wasn’t going to let this little creature ruin my time in the fancy hotel and went about my goal of lounging and ordering room service.  There was a TV mounted into the wall above the faucet in the tub so I was pleasantly unaware, for the most part, of the cockroach in the room with me.

When Trudy called to check in she asked me if I could take care of that situation.  She still wanted management to see it.  I too thought that this would be helpful for the hotel to have the evidence of this creature to share with their pest control folks so I called the front desk.  A woman answered “how can I help you?”

“I’m not sure but there is a huge cockroach… (she gasped and hardly let me finish my sentence) in our room.”

“I’ll send an engineer up right away.”

I picked things up somewhat around the room.  I finished getting dressed for the day.  I paced.  It wasn’t “right away” in my opinion by a long shot but I don’t really officially know how long it took.  Finally, there was a knock on the door.  I found myself reaching for it for the second time (room service earlier) without using the peephole or hesitating in any way prior to opening the door.  I am way too trusting sometimes.

This white man, whom I would guess to be in his mid to late fifties walked in.  He was talking on a two-way radio.  I walked into the bathroom, hoping he would follow, and pointed to the upside-down glass on the floor.  He finished his conversation, grabbed a “welcome…” card from the sink area and attempted to slide it under the cup to get the cockroach. 

He picked it up, the glass that is, and he dropped the cockroach.  He quickly caught the cockroach.  I gave him something sturdier to put under the cup and was trying to suggest he use the paper lid that came on the cup to secure it -when he dropped the cockroach again.  This time, he trapped it between his two boots and preceded to squoosh it and then stomp on it, smashing it down.  He grabbed a tissue and dumped it into the toilet.  He grabbed another tissue and wiped up the remainder of the guts from the floor and his boots.

As he was leaving he said, in all sincerity, “Have a nice day sir”.

I was NOT horrified, as in years past, by being called “sir”.  Instead, I wondered what kind of a man he thought I was – wondering what kind of a wimp he thought I was that I couldn’t squoosh the cockroach myself.  He didn’t seem to have those dots connected either.  It was very normal, for him, that I was “sir” and didn’t register to him that I should be ‘man enough’ to kill the cockroach myself.

I was embarrassed about that.  I wanted to explain that I assumed management would indeed want to see it, that they would want evidence of this unwelcome visitor among us.  I wanted to say I could have killed the cockroach on my own had I known that was all his engineer skills were going to provide for me.  I wanted to say that I wasn’t afraid of the cockroach.  Instead, I thanked him and told him to have a nice day too.

I suppose that, later in the day, he might have laughed about the “gay guy” that he had to rescue from the cockroach.  I was embarrassed but this was better than feeling threatened.

When I left the hotel, the male staff members holding open the door called me “sir”.

When I got a visit from my friend Isabella, now five years old but nearly six, she whispered (loudly) in her mother’s ear to ask if I was a boy or a girl.  She said I had a mustache so that means I am a boy.  The good thing about her though is that I was able to give her an answer to her question and we moved on.

Trudy invited me for drinks with her co-workers when she finished work for the day.  I found myself standing outside in an alley (smoking a cigarette) behind a bar downtown with three other “real men”/”strait men” who were beer-drinkin’, hammer-usin’, sports-watchin’, go-to-strip-clubs men.  Two of them knew me (they work with Trudy) but one of them was a complete stranger.  It never occurred to him that I was not ‘one of the guys’.  This had the added twist of having to talk about sex when he asked me what I did for a living.

“What do you do for a living man?” he asked.

“I work at an AIDS service organization.”

“My son doesn’t use condoms…”

I am convinced, although admittedly I cannot be certain, that this man never once caught on that I was a woman.  He was the type who might have reacted poorly had he figured this out.

I got called “sir” every time I went to and from the hotel all day long.  I couldn’t really count actually how many times my gender was misinterpreted or questioned today.  It was “Sir Saturday” apparently.

Was it the baseball cap?

How do they miss my breasts?  My voice?  My hands, fingers, rings…?

I don’t mind… like I used to…

I am not trying for this reaction.  I am not sure what to do with it all when it happens.  What I do know is that I felt safer today than normal around the strangers who simply assumed I was a man.  And that was interesting to notice.

Wollner's Writing

non-winning essay (What Would…)

What Would Your Mother Say?

My mother, Judy, really is an outstanding woman.  I could write books about her character and life.  In the interest of keeping it simple for this essay however, I will only share a broader view for now.  She is one of nine children, born and raised on a farm in Northern Iowa.  It would be an understatement to say that she had to work hard during her childhood.  Daily chores on the farm engrained in her a sense of work ethic and fortitude that few can match.Even more important than hard work, her devotion to Catholicism and to her family has never wavered.  She attends church regularly and prays rather consistently throughout her days.  She has always put family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, and strangers in need for that matter, above herself.  My mother works hard, prays hard, and lives life to the fullest.Not falling far from the tree, my intensity level matches my mother’s.  This definitely added some fuel to the fire during some rather tumultuous times in our relationship over the years.  Having grown up quite a bit and grown out of most of my rebelliousness though, I have, for many years now, been able to understand my mother and her intentions – which I believe are always in the right place.  I am able to see her strength, compassion, and never-ending love for not just me but anyone who crosses her path.  I have the utmost respect for how she lives – working to help others, surviving difficult times, and maintaining her faith and appreciation for life.

And yet, I hit a writer’s block every time I have even thought about including her in my work.  How can I do her justice with words?  How can I balance writing honestly about her humanity and simultaneously give her credit for the “sainthood” she is closer to than many?

In fairness to myself, I have only begun to take my writing seriously in the last few years.  I have struggled with my own acceptance of this new label as a writer.  More recently, I attended a week-long memoir class at the University of Iowa.  It was due to this recent experience that I am a step closer on how to address my mother in my writing.

  I was standing outside smoking a cigarette one afternoon before class.  All of a sudden, a woman I had met earlier in the week walked up behind me and asked “What would your mother say?” in reference to the cigarette in my hand.“My mother has something to say about a lot of things that I do,” I replied.I am not entirely sure why this woman’s question made me stop in my tracks and actually consider stomping out my cigarette.  I am not sure why I was embarrassed by her question.  I am not sure why I didn’t have my normal resentment about another non-smoker feeling the need to point out my habit.  Rather, I heard her question.  And have heard it over and over again for weeks now inside my head.

What would my mother say?
The question hit me hard.  The funny thing though is that I am much more concerned about what she would have to say about things other than my smoking habit.  We both know smoking is not a smart habit and therefore it is not a topic worth discussing.  I trust that she prays for me to stop smoking and I can appreciate that.  I assume that she knows that it is a goal of mine, and something that I work on, to become a non-smoker.  Honestly, my mother has not tried to tell me how to live my life on any issue for over a decade now.  And I have “come out” to her about many things over the years, including my struggles with an eating disorder and depression as well as my sexuality issues.  So why is it that I am so concerned to tell her that I am a writer?  I think that I am most afraid that she would worry or become defensive that I might write something bad about her.  Clearly, having my own struggles with how to write honestly and with integrity, instead of simply trying to sell a good story, I can understand if she would be nervous about what I might share with the public.  I will have to somehow be able to explain to her my intentions of sharing how important she has been and remains in my life.That being said, I am not yet “out” to her about my intentions to write memoirs.  Therefore I did not share with her that I had taken a week off of work and attended this class.  I have not yet been prepared to have the conversation with her about my developing writing career.
It bothered me to drive through the State of Iowa and past where she and my father live to get to the class and not stop for a visit.  I was again feeling sad and upset with myself on the drive home from the class.  I felt the urge to call her and to stop.  And yet, the fears around telling her what I was doing in Iowa City outweighed my willingness to stop and say hello on my way home.
It was a five hour drive and therefore I had plenty of time to ponder why I had not spoken of my writing yet, to change my mind over and over about possibly stopping to visit, and to hear again and again the most recent burning question, “What would your mother say?” in my head. I had made it about two and half hours.  I had been processing all of the stories I had written, heard, and read all week long, all of the relationships I had begun and the interactions I had had.  My mind was a whirlwind of thoughts and dreams and stories.  As I got closer to the town where my parents live, I began to “write” a story in my head about what my mother would say.  So there I was driving along and all of a sudden I noticed black clouds rolling in.  I noticed that it was beginning to sprinkle.  That it was no longer daylight even though it was only four in the afternoon.  And suddenly, I was driving in a full-fledged storm.  I was scared.  I called home and Trudy, my partner of almost ten years, assured me it was not storming at home and that I would drive out of this.  I lost my phone signal.  I wanted to call her back right away but I heard snapping and crackling in my headset and lightening was all over the place.  I decided it was probably not safe to be chatting away on a mobile phone while driving in the midst of what could be a tornado or, at the very least, a serious storm.  The wind was blowing so hard that the car was whipping back and forth.
“Keep your hands on the wheel,” I heard my mother saying, “watch where you are going.”
That is what she would say.That is good advice.I gripped the steering wheel and focused on the road ahead as much as possible given that I couldn’t really see anything.  I flashed back to my mother driving through rain or snow storms when I was younger.  I remember being in the passenger seat once and afraid about whether or not we would make it to our destination.  I asked my mother how she could tell if she was in her lane or not.  She explained how she watches the lines on the edge of the road and gages where she is at so that she doesn’t go into the ditch.  This is advice I have used many times while driving at night or during storms.
I certainly needed this reminder right then as it continued to darken outside more rapidly.  I could barely see.  The noise from the overwhelming rain, gushing wind and the pounding thunder gave me a headache.  The road was noticeably slippery and I had to grip tight to hold the car on the road.
I admit that I was pretty much terrified at this point.  I wondered if I should stop and pull over and wait the storm out.  I wondered again about whether or not I should just get off the highway and stop at my parent’s house.  I scanned the sky whenever possible, looking for funnel clouds or a sign that this would perhaps break up soon.
And then I heard my mother again… “Say some Hail Mary’s.”
“Say ten Hail Mary’s and you’ll be alright” her voice added.
As far away as I have run from Catholicism or avoided it and stepped back and forth into and out of it over my life – I have never had an aversion to the Hail Mary prayer.  It has, on numerous occasions, been my mantra when in the midst of fear or needing support to continue on.
I was trying to entertain myself by still trying to “write” the “What would your mother say?” essay in my head but by then I was too freaked out to concentrate.  I had to focus on the road.
“Keep your hands on the wheel” I heard her voice.
I focused.  I gripped both hands around the wheel at ten and two.  I held steady.
“Watch where you are going” she added.
I kept my main vision on the road ahead (from what I could tell of it) but also used my peripheral vision to keep an eye on the lines to keep me away from the ditch on the passenger side of the road.
“Say some Hail Mary’s” she repeated in my head.
I did.
I said them slowly and deliberately.  I was tempted to rattle them off the way the older nuns would do it in church saying the rosary when I was growing up – at the speed of light – inhaling and saying the entire prayer during one exhale as one gigantic word…  seriously – one breath, one word.
But I was honestly terrified.  I am much more stable than in previous periods of my life and therefore much less melodramatic.  And yet, I am keenly aware of how easily people die.  I am smart enough to know that on any given day, my time could be up.  And how poetic would it be if a storm took me out on the way home from this writer’s class where I finally felt like I knew what to do with my life.  And how good of a story would it have made that I lost a signal with Trudy and she would be sending my parents out to look for me soon.  It was not beyond possibility that I could be killed driving in this massive storm out in the middle of Iowa farm country.
I kept my hands on the wheel.  I kept my eyes on the road and watched where I was going.  And I began to very seriously continue to say the Hail Mary’s.
“Ten ought to be enough” I heard my mother add in my head.
I prayed that God would keep me safe and get me through this storm.
It popped into my head that perhaps my mother – having power not unlike Mother Nature herself at times, had felt that I was in fact near and fixing to drive past her town without a visit.  That her emotional response to this might have stirred up the storm.
Was it a sign?
Should I stop?
I was south of town and prayed that the storm was going east.  I believed that if I could get past the south side of town and head north that I would drive out of the storm.
I was going about 40 miles an hour at the most.  Pitch dark.  Unable to see.
“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee…” I chanted out loud.
I would lose my place in the middle of the prayer and have to start over.  I would sometimes have to say it the fast-nun way to remind me of the words.  It is more difficult to say it slowly.  You have to mean it then.
My mind raced.  But I kept track of how many genuine Hail Mary’s I had said with my fingers on the steering wheel.  White knuckles on the steering wheel, my hands and arms tingling and falling asleep by then.
I somehow made the curve around the outskirts of the town and began to head north.  I still had three more exits I could take to stop at my parent’s house.  I was on my 9th Hail Mary.  The rain was still coming down hard, dark clouds everywhere.
“Have faith Wollner.  You will drive out of this soon.” I said to myself.
I rounded the bend completely and said my 10th Hail Mary.
And the sun shone ahead of me in the distance.
And the rain started to lighten up.
And the daylight was beginning to return.
And the lightening and thunder was suddenly behind me.
Ten Hail Mary’s were exactly enough.
I had survived the storm.
“Hail Judy” I thought.  And Hail Mary.  And hail anyone or anything else that has watched my back and helped me through the many storms over the years.
Would I have survived the storm without the Hail Mary prayers?  Had my mother sensed, like so many other times of distress in my life, that I was in danger and kicked in her own prayers for me during that half an hour or so that I struggled to stay on the road?  Were my prayers merely a distraction from my fears?  Would I have been just as safe had I left my rap music blaring and sung along instead of praying out loud?Who knows?I personally believe in the power of prayer and I learned this from my mother.  But I also know that none of us truly knows the mysteries around spirituality, religion, and what happens to us after death.

What would my mother say?

She would be thrilled to know that I still say the Hail Mary prayer when I am in distress.  She would be relieved to know that I am a very safe driver and happy to hear that I still use advice she taught me from behind the wheel when I was a teenager.  Clearly she doesn’t approve that I smoke.  Only time will tell if I am ever able to give that habit up.  And, as I develop my writing career, I will most certainly learn what she has to say about the stories that I intend to tell.

In the meantime, I will have integrity with the words that I write and work up the nerve to tell her one of these days that I am a writer.