M
This
particular journey has always been a difficult subject about which to talk or
write.
Although
I have spoken with three or four psychologists and therapists, I still have
difficulty coming to terms with, or even understanding, my sexual identity.
My
quandary began at age 6 when a teenage counselor at a United Church summer camp
molested me. He introduced me to what the male body could do although, at that
age, I don’t think I fully comprehended. However, the experience ignited in me
a continued fascination with sexuality.
I've
always had problems accepting that experience as molestation. To me, even then,
I didn’t do anything I didn't want to do.
Between
that time and puberty, I would look for opportunities to discover the
differences between boys and girls.
One
time, after another boy compared our penises, it brought me into very painful
contact with my father's belt when he found out.
At
age 13, I experienced my first orgasm while drying myself after a bath. That
event also began an 11-year ritual of daily masturbation, and a form of
escapism I would turn to whenever I felt depressed, ill, or lonely.
My
mid-teen years saw me begin to write short stories and, of course, sexual
fantasies made their way into my notepads and on typewriter paper.
Adolescence
also brought with it the beginning of a continual struggle with gender
identity. Because I didn't think I was ‘man’ enough, I believed I should have
been born a woman.
I
seemed drawn to ‘feminine’ interests—music, art, fashion, make-up, etc.
‘Masculine’ interests such as cars, planes, trains, sports—these held no
interest for me.
I
would dress up in my mother's clothes. Later, after picking up a magazine in a
bookstore and looking at it, I thought I might also be a transvestite.
Later,
after seeing The Christine Jorgensen Story, I wanted to get an operation
to become a woman. But the means to do so and the necessary finances were way
out of my reach.
I
would always wish I could have hung out with the girls in school, even though I
was extremely shy at the time. And they always treated me like a boy.
I
would ‘fall in love’ with almost any girl who showed an interest in me; hence
the number of songs about some of them in my EarthGirls songbook.
I
lost my virginity at age 23.
I
met a young woman in the laundry department of Calgary General Hospital. We
became fast friends, and one night in her apartment, she asked me how many
women I’d had sex with.
“None,”
I replied sheepishly. “I'm a virgin.”
She
looked rather surprised, and then exclaimed, “This is too good of an
opportunity to pass up!”
She
subsequently dragged me into her bedroom.
That
night fulfilled the fantasies of my teen years in more ways than one.
Getting married in 1974 at
the age of 27 didn't quell any of my quandaries regarding my sexuality.
Certainly it gave me an
outlet for my desires for sexual pleasure, but even that was not enough to satiate the desire.
I ended up having extramarital sex a couple of
times, and soon discovered that I had bisexual tendencies.
Now, at
age 75, although the yearnings still manifest themselves, physically, it's
becoming increasingly more difficult to fulfill them.
However, many of my past experiences
proved to be an inspiration for (or occasionally find themselves represented in) my writing.
This is how it is now.