2 years as a hermaphrodite...

   This is a photo of me and my surgically excised vagina from 1997. I'd like to thank Burnside for encouraging  me to come out with it and to not be ashamed of it. When I first showed it to Sage, L.J. and Pigpen, I thought they would cast me off as a unwanted freak. They're some gnarly dudes. But quite the opposite happened on that day, They were noticably turned on and I think they were already scheeming to try and get me in the sack! If memory serves me right, Sage was the most excited of the bunch and quickly exposed his junk at it and exclaimed ," Lemme fuck it!" There's video footage of that day that I wish would turn up. I think Dirty Butt has it.  

   From that day forth, I skated untethered from ridicule under that bridge for 2 years. Sure there was the occasional cat-calls to "show them my pussy" but I believe it was all in good fun and I never felt pressured by anyone to really do it. I wasn't in fear of being overpowered by any of the boys so sometimes at parties I would show it off to everyone and bask in the beauty of some tip-top surgical mastery.

  The hardest part about caring for my new genitallia was coming to grips with "Aunt Flo" or the current of "Red River" if you catch my drift. I was a card carrying male for 24 years and having to manage my time of month was quite the experience.  There were days where I'd mull around the house in my sweatpants, eating a gallon of ice cream and making everyone around me miserable. I made myself mierable too because I was also conversly male and I couldnt understand why I was being such a bitch to myself!

   And then it all changed... Heartbreak. That fateful day when my beautiful vagina sealed up and seemed gone forever. My Dr. explained it to me that sometimes the body miscarries the new organ and seeks to heal itself back to original form. He assured me we could try again if I wished it so but the anguish and pain of my loss had defeated my resolve.  Almost 2 years to the day, I had to accept that I wasnt meant to be a modern chimera. I was gonna have to be okay with just being Mike. A man. No more,no less. 

  I will sometimes ponder this picture and remember it as a time when inner beauty inside myself was at its zenith. When social and sexual walls were crumbling at the sight of such spectacle.  I cannot ever look back with regret or denial that I helped to further this notion. I must carry these truths with me forever and show others that its okay to love yourself no mattter what.