being that I intend to move west and to a rural area very soon, someplace in between chico/redding, CA and eugene area of OR, but NOT in any city; I guess I can say that I am both disappointed and glad. I guess it is better then nothing- as in the former dial up shit.

I am not a parent and never was, so I feel I can't comment. yet I feel they have their rights to discuss things that may disgust others just as much as those in toiletstool.com have their rights to talk about their bathroom functions [ or far worse being the much more extreme " Army of God" , Operation Rescue, KKK, in their sites- yeesh!]

Yet as a single, lesbian-transwoman, I learned of a site from an article in Gay Parent where this lesbian couple discusses all the family stuff about their child's " Christmas Adventures with the family and more". It both had me in tears wondering about what having an LGBT family was like, as well as thinking " Maybe Mrs. Governor Sarah Palin needs to read this before defining 'traditional family' for the rest of us!"

I am a transwoman and I did enjoy your article. I was able to relate to the part of never being able to connect, back as

" It"; with women even though I liked them sexual-attraction wise.

I hate to say this, but I was that angry person much like our good Salon.com friend & foe, Brightstar 2- the resurrection [ of sexist attitudes toward ALL women]. My life with women was miserable and I too, back as " It", always wanted to connect with a woman in that same, intimate manner that women connect with other women.

Back as " It" , I hated women men saw as " pretty" because they got to look and act feminine; yet I always liked strong, butch-women, " femmy-dykes" if you may whom acted more like guys in many ways.[ Ellen De Generes, Melissa Etheridge, etc. were always hot to me! real women whom talked loud and sat with their legs apart instead of crossed " like a

lady" ]

In fact I still remember, at age 21, when I told some really butch lesbian I met that I found her attractive. She at first could not understand why any " guy" would see her as cute, telling me " but I'm a dyke!" But after hearing me say something like " because I can talk to you person to person without treating you as a princess"; she surely understood.

Yet I still did not understand why I liked butch women, but " hated" most women whom I saw as gold diggers expecting a paid for first date!

coming out finally in May 2005 after 15 years of "playing girl" in every unisex restroom I could find to avoid that dreaded other room, as well as feeling that " I could never get her....so why not be her?" ; I realized just why I loved " dykes" so much! I WANTED TO BE THE ONE WHOM WORE THAT SKIRT! the one whom would get asked out, rather then having to do the asking out and paying.

Soon after , I did the legal name and, on driver's license here in Connecticut, gender change back in 2006- despite my family's wishes that I'd stay as " the person that they knew." and recently, three years on hormones and still not 100%

" passable" [ because of being unable to afford facial laser hair removal], I went on my first lesbian date when a butchy-femme biological-lesbian woman asked me out to Borders Books-Cafe.

It surely felt different to be the one to wear that denim skirt and have HER treat me at first[ later, I offered to buy us both something, feeling both guilty and like I was not going along with the " dutch treat dating etiquette" as mentioned in the book by Sydney Porkony- " So You want to be a Lesbian?" She was dressed in shorts and a flannel shirt by the way- which was awesome!

Though my life is still very much a mess and I am in the process of moving to the west coast, that and I am NOT 100% passable yet; I still would never want to go back to being that angry " It" thing which I was.

I have become reasonably comfortable in my transition when dealing with those whom heckle or shun me, mostly MEN but some women also. Comfortable enough to take the risks that I used to take as " It" , yet with a new found sense of knowing when to avoid certain circumstances, woman's intuition which screams out " beware of dangerous, ignorant MEN."

In fact I will soon be driving alone all the way to first California , and then Oregon- taking the BACK ROUTES all the way from Southbury, CT to Pismo Beach, CA through so called

" hostile redneck" Red States like Western PA,WV,OH,IN, Southern IL, MO, and yes,KANSAS . I've been warned to stay on the freeways, but I would just like to see what the so-called " United States" of America are really like; feeling that I have the right to do so like any other American would.

It still sucks that, as pre-SRS Transsexual, I do not have the right to live as myself in many of those " Middle America" States I will be going through, others down in Dixie from Florida to Brightstar's beloved TEXAS.

But that's not fixing to stop me from being who I am happy being! Hello Seymour, IN; Pocahontas, Illinois [ IL being a transgender rights state-perhaps not necessarily in Gretchen Wilson's beloved Pocahontas]; Salina and Weskan, Kansas! I am here and QUEER, get used to it! [ and I have Pepper-Mace handy!]