The Making of Paula             by : Paul G Jutras               PAULJUTRAS@PRODIGY.NET

 

Born in June of 1970 I started out with a troubled birth. As my mother told me, I was pronounced medically dead and revived three times in the hospital and looked after before I was allowed to be taken home. I guess even then my female soul was rejecting my male body.

As I grew up an only child, my father left the military and opened his own motel and restaurant on neighboring properties. He spent most of his time working in the office while my other chamber maid. I found I preferred spending my time with my mother and the other chamber maids in cleaning the motel rather than with my father in the office. He was here that I found a lost cat. Even though my father hated cats, agreed I could keep her. Adding another female to my surroundings so to speak. Mom and I soon found a strong bound of friendship. I knew she wouldn’t believe me that one Christmas Eve at midnight when I thought I heard sleigh bells and something on the roof top.

When we weren’t working in the hotel we went to the book store and she’d ride me on her bike while I hanged on. When we drove around we’d listen to the same music. Mom did her best to teach me how to ride a bike, but I never could do it. Born with one leg shorter than the other, I couldn’t get the right balance between the two pedals to keep the speed and balance to stay up right anymore than I could tell her how much I wanted the play sets of lipstick and nail polish that supermarkets sold. That didn’t stop me from using a straight razor on my legs and body when I hit my teens.

My two best friends were a brother and sister named Jason and Missy. We were considered the three musketeers by our parents since we did almost everything together. Missy and I set up a little club house in my backyard where we’d have tea parties mostly which Missy and I enjoyed. We also played games that Jason liked; such as pretending it to be a castle. Growing up in the state of Maine here in the United States, I loved it when winter came and we’d ice skate and sled. With the prickle bushes at the bottom of hill it was always fun trying to see who could get closest to the bushes without getting pricked. Then a new boy moved into the neighborhood. His bad influence on Jason resulted in him stealing some of toys and making me glad that I preferred turn more to playing Barbie with Missy than cops and robbers with the two boys name Jason. When a company came out with a series to put yourself and your friends as the stars of the book and worked He did help me raise charity money for the MS Read-A-Thon.

As time went by I found myself getting more and more depressed during the holidays. While mom handled my birthday, my Great Grandmother handles Thanksgiving and my Grandmother handle Christmas. Jealous at the beautiful outfits my cousins Jennifer and Katrina lovely outfits. They hated getting dress up in nylons and frilly clothes and would always kick off their heels or Mary Jane’s to move about in their stockings feet. As the photographer in the family I often took lots of shots with them so that when I was alone in the house in my moms clothes I could lay back and imagine that I was either of them. When I first read about the Composite Superman in DC comics I’d image what it would be like to take the best quality of both of the two girls and put them into one girl that could be Paula.

As I kept growing up, things often happened around me. Like the boy in the movie Poltergeist, my room was covered in all sort of Star Wars items. I even had a clown doll mom gave me in a rocker chair and an old tree outside the bedroom window that cause me to really get spook when I actually saw the Poltergeist film. Of course the fact that my house was actually haunted didn’t help any. When I was six I woke up to sounds that I couldn’t identify. When I sat up in the bed, I saw a skull floating straight through the bedroom wall. No more than she believed that I saw what could of been a UF0 one day when I waiting for others at the bus area. Especially since the foot thumps and such only happened when I was alone. At least till the day the Jason who was my former best friend came buy to show his knew bee-bee gun. I took a carving knife out of the draw and we searched for the source of the sound never to find it. The worst happened many years later when I was 17 and was watching TV. After the footsteps an invisible hand griped my throat and tried to chock the life out of me. A swing of the leg into it drove it off.

That was later. When dad sold the hotel and went back into the military and my mom got a job at the chamber of commerce, I was lucky to see him 3 weeks out of the year. Which was find since it kept my secrets such as the fact I always preferred peeing sitting down a secret from him. Not to mention going about the house in my moms shoes and clothes.

As I grew older, and outgrew mom’s clothes I only wore her hose; which was much warmer in the Maine winters than long johns. Especially the feet area. Mom would still get upset with me when I would sit cross legged, saying only gay people do that. She was also be upset when I’d buy my own costume jewelry at the store and wear her hats about town. Especially the hose at school during the winter. Since I preferred using the stales to sit down anyway, it wasn’t like anyone at school would know. Even though I did have a close call once during drama class as we had take off our shoes and do a cave-age performance. I was lucky not to have the nylons on that day.

As I moved up the grades even more, I was always more of a tom boy than a normal boy. A tom boy like my mother as I considered our personalities so such the same with much the same tastes. Though she preferred to dress up less than me. Like the bit about crossing the legs I could never understand the big deal my parents and teachers had about me removing my shoes in the class room and go about in my stocking feet like the girls did. "Why okay for them and no me?" I’d think to myself. Especially the year I spent in a private school my dad had gone to when he was my age. I’d find myself even more jealous of the lovely clothes the girls wore while I was stuck in blazers, though avoided a tie. It was there; however, I learned the different shades of nylons since my mom and I only wore nude or tan. The type I wore when mom first caught on winter Saturday where I wore it all day until mom caught me and ordered me to take it off.

When it came time graduate high school I was never so happy was my gown was as close a dress as I wore since I out grew her clothes. I told my mother my feelings and she went to Church to talk to a priest only to be told Christians don’t do that. That’s when she gave up her faith on The Church and made me try to be the man she wanted me to be.

When I got to collage in Florida, I tried my hand at business classes. When I got the form for dorm sign up form I almost marked Transsexual, but at that time I didn’t know the different in CD, TS, TV, so I didn’t know what I was. Ended up just marking Male. I tried to get in the study dorm when I filed it out, but ended up in the party dorm. It was like something out of Animal House as I’d go home on the weekends to study and return to find the stall doors ripped off the hinges and holes in the plaster. One weekend the party got so bad that the kids tossed chairs out the upstairs window and smashed the cars in the parking lot. With my roommate always bring his girlfriend to sleep over and the other guys bring their girls for sleep over, I wouldn’t mention or bare my feelings toward them. It was around this time that Katrina had herself a sleep over one of the weekends I was home. I really wished I could of been invited, but she at least gave me a picture. After years of games such as house where I’d sometimes be father and sometimes the pregnant daughter with a pillow under my shirt, she had been the first family member that I revealed my feelings toward. Though I never did ask her for some of her nail polish like I’d like to of.

I did enjoy during collage reading Cosmo and other fashion magazine I’d borrow from my female classmates. I also got full internet access and started to deal some real research for the difference in TS and TV so I’d know what I was. It was during this time I also joined the Japanese cartoon club at the local comic shop. I would bring my videos, mostly a collection of stuff like Ranma ½ and other videos that included TG themes to them. I would buy Sailormoon posters, stickers and other items that has made the members wonder about me over the years. They’ve even called weird from time to time. I considered dressing up a girl for the costume parties but I would want people to think of me as a real girl not think of the clothes as a costume.

I didn’t work while I went to collage, but when I graduated I got myself a job at a local supermarket. With my own money, I could buy my own nylons and fishnets in a variety of colors. With work having unisex uniforms, I would spend my break reading fashion magazines and talking girl talk with the female co-workers as I did with my female friends back in Jr. High and High School lunch time. Like most of the girl workers, I’d wear nylons under my pants. I sometimes had fantasy of being caught at work. There was also where I learned of NAIR and started asking how good it was with fair that if I didn’t wash it all off my hands when done that it would cause me trouble the next time I’d shampoo my hair.

With dad gone for six months I talked to mom about my feelings again and this time I started with a counselor. My mistake was to start when a cold front was going through. Wearing pants and a sweat shirt was a mistake since the counselor would not take someone looking the way I did serious about a sex change. Especially since I was a bit worried about the liver and other damage I read about during my research on the net and talking with the many TS and TV friends I met over the internet. After the third visit I realized he wasn’t going to understand or cover around and dropped him only to turn to trying to get my mother to come around to my side.

Now dad will come home in two weeks and it a matter a choice of what I do now on to ruin Christmas for my parents or not. At any rate the road from Paul to Paula is never ending thing with hope on the horizon that mom will love me enough to side toward me against dad.

 

NOT THE END......

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