Everything Nice A Late-Onset Coming-of-Age Story by Lannie Rose -- Published by Lulu -- With love to my Misha, who you’ll meet in the last chapter (and the Forward). First Lulu edition October 1, 2008 ISBN: 978-1-4357-5377-8 EVERYTHING NICE: A LATE-ONSET COMING-OF-AGE STORY. Copyright © 2008 by Lannie Rose. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author. Acknowledgements Everyone whom I acknowledged in my previous two books, please consider yourselves thanked again. You made a huge, positive impact on my life, which I can only hope to repay by paying it forward. Because this is my life story, I’d like to especially thank my parents, who did an incredibly fine job of raising me and my three rapscallion siblings on shoestring, when they were just kids themselves. You modeled love, loyalty, and fidelity for me with your more than fifty years of marriage, and while I may not have emu- lated it, at least I know what it looks like. Finally, my gratitude to my Misha: my friend, lover, supporter, and editor. When it comes to you, words fail me … maybe I’ll be able to write more about you in my next book. I have been to the dungeons I have been to the dungeons, Where corpulent, bare-breasted women are shackled to crosses, And flogged with whips of leather, horsehair, rope. The spanking gloves are heavy, the welts are real, And the screams mix pain and ecstasy. (My screams, but not my ecstasy.) Oh, I have been to the dungeons. I have been to the sex clubs, Where hollow-eyed men dressed only in towels, Wander through the rooms, begging for release. They watch with hunger as others get it on, And stroke themselves in envious contemplation. (Contemplation of me!) Oh, I have been to the sex clubs. I have been to the gay bars, Where bare-chested men gyrate crotch-to-ass, The pounding house beat drowning out the talk. Pickups for a night or a quick fuck, The bathrooms full of blow, and being blown. (Well, just a taste.) Oh, I have been to the gay bars. I have been to the raves, Where young people, stoked on chemicals, Shiver and shake to throbbing trance music. Eyes, wide with ecstasy, follow the lasers and whirling light sticks, And couples, on mats, languorously stroke each other’s bodies. (Please stroke me.) Oh, I have been to the raves. I have been to drag clubs, Where sultry, big-haired vixens ply their craft, Lip-syncing disco hits and joking lewd. Cross-dressers with a pass to flirt and dance, Transsexuals longing to be normal for a night. (Oh, to be normal.) Oh, I have been to the drag clubs. vi I have been to the furrie cons, Where life-size cartoon animals frolic, A slender lizard darts from place to place. Klingons carouse (they must be lost in space), And scritching kitty brings pleasure to us both. (Here, kitty, kitty!) Oh, I have been to the furrie cons. I have been to the goth clubs, Where heavy-booted dancers all in black, Stomp out their furious, eccentric dance. While Satanic music everlasting rumbles, Perhaps a dungeon in the back, dripping with fire and wax. (I wore black, too.) Oh, I have been to the goth clubs. I have been to the swingers parties, Where small talk kills the hours before the orgy, As the participants gather with the quiet confidence Of knowing they will all get some tonight. Then, on the mattress, couplings of all kinds. (And triplings, and more, as I recall.) Oh, I have been to the swingers parties. I have been to the women’s clubs, Where leather- and denim-clad dykes shoot pool, Female couples bop or sway in sweet embrace. Dancers on platforms in bikinis, A lone, puzzled dude wonders why he cannot score. (Why don’t you hit on me, you dunce?) Oh, I have been to the women’s clubs. Oh, many things I’ve seen, and places, been, Not just to watch, but to participate. Yet without one to love, it’s just a game, And therefore, on I search to find my mate. vii Contents Forward 1 Introduction 3 Prologue 5 The Happiest Place on Earth 7 Coast to Coast 9 Go 18 Marine 24 Transitions 29 Hearts 34 Butterfly Effect 49 LTRs 57 Suite: Judy Blue Eyes 59 Marriage 70 Divorce 79 “Yes, ma’am” 86 The Love of My Life 98 R-Drive 104 Busted 108 An Independent Businesswoman 113 Cross-Dressing 121 A Whole New World 123 Deflowered 128 Lannie Rose 136 Trannie Shack 143 Pride 148 Treat Her Like a Lady 161 We’re Trannies! 167 Leather ‘n’ Lace 177 Getting Clocked 188 First Date 192 ix A New Woman 197 September 2001 199 Over the Rainbow 214 Family Reunions 218 Admirer 222 Sex Change 232 Falling Into the Pit 240 How I Popped My Cherry 261 Climbing Out of the Pit 273 Dating 291 Hello, Dali! 293 Disclosure 310 Bad Sex 325 Coupling 331 Sexual Hubris 346 Something Fishy 357 Return to craigslist 367 Munch 374 Wham, Bam, Thank You Ma’am, Eh? 395 Two Dates 413 More Family Reunions 423 Vaya Con Dios 425 The Big “C” 438 A Tale of Two Soldiers 448 Truce 453 Lannie Takes Manhattan 458 Happily Ever After 478 Epilogue — Sugar and Spice 481 x Everything Nice Forward I met Lannie at a dinner party – you know, one of those inter- minable bore-fests that makes you glad they are having it at a restau- rant with a full bar. It was a seat-yourself affair; and I didn’t know anyone. Lannie looked cute and affable, so I figured: nande kuso. It turned out to be a fortuitous decision; Lannie was a lot of fun and, as it transpired, was an author. I don’t write, myself – I can’t; I’m just not good at it. My talents lie in another direction. I am an editor; I do not create, I destroy. I like to think of my- self as a sort of literary Shiva – with less dancing. (I can’t dance, ei- ther. Well, maybe the gavotte – thank you, Mr. Fell.) Normally, as an editor, I feel an almost subconscious sense of irritation when seated next to a writer, or worse – an author. But, oddly, I found Lannie’s company delightful. She discovered I was an editor and co-opted a tacit agreement from me to edit her next book – this volume, in fact. (Her sex change memoir, LANNIE! My Journey from Man to Woman, had almost just hit the bookshelves, a state that persists to this day.) Besides having complementary literary skills, that night we also discovered a common sharp wit and a certain chemical attraction. I asked Lannie out to dinner, and she said yes. Boy meets girl, blah blah blah… Eventually, we grew to love each other. (When you get to be a certain age, you need to be careful not to fall in love—you could break a hip or something.) I did wind up editing this book, and even contributing this Forward. I wanted to write this Forward simply to tell you this: I’ve read every word of Everything Nice, many of them more than once. I picked at every punctuation mark and made copious continuity charts—basically, the tedium that is the editor’s lot in life. But, hav- 1 Everything Nice ing done so, I could (and no doubt will) read it all over again, be- cause Everything Nice is like spending time with a wonderful friend. So here I am, and here you are. Spend a little time with my wonderful Lannie. You’ll be glad you did. Misha Ledebur July 2008 2 Introduction My so-called sex change was a journey of self-discovery and growth that started with the glimmer of a realization that my gender might be different than that of almost all the other boys and girls and later men and women I’d ever met. I’d barely passed the first milepost on my journey when I had my sex change surgery — I had miles left to go. My progress can be charted in my books. I wrote the first one, How To Change Your Sex: A Lighthearted Look at the Hardest Thing You’ll Ever Do, while I was recuperating from my sur- gery. It’s not about me much at all; it’s about the gender transition process in general. By my second book, LANNIE! My Journey from Man to Woman, I felt enough self-worth that I could tell my personal story — but only the story of Lannie, not of Eddy. My male life still seemed worthless, uninteresting, and somewhat embarrassing. But now, with Everything Nice, I’ve come to appreciate the value of my pre-Lannie life, and I’m ready to share it with you. Frankly, I still find a lot of my Eddy life to be pretty dull. I was a workaholic and an alcoholic (two good ways to hide from my gender issues), but you won’t find much about that in the present book. It’s much too boring! What you will find here is my sex life: my relationships and my sadly unimpressive experience between the sheets. I feel that these aspects of my life are important to document because so few novels and memoirs describe them as they really are — not in clinical sterility or pornographic lucidity, but in journalistic veracity.