Mushaboom

Bucking tonight's trend, I am not going to write about the New Year or the past year or the past decade. Here, we'll talk about today. I'll do my best to be brief.

We finally got around to gift returns and exchanges, plus we had $60 of "Kohl's Cash" that had to be spent before it expired. Mrs. Leslie wanted to exchange a couple of her gifts from me (size issues), plus she's been shopping for clip earrings for my 14-year-old. We scoured the clearance racks, and I felt like an old pro. I was looking at stuff with an eye for both of us. There are definitely some things I'd like to check out. At one point, I expressed an interest in spending some of the Kohl's Cash on myself. Why I had to hint at this, I don't know. A surprised reaction, but only a question about what I wanted to get. She knows. She can see me handling these garments. My pupils must be huge staring at them.

We moved on to the earrings. We found a lot of cool Trefari clip-ons. She selected three for our daughter, then went off to exchange her father's pants. I stayed awhile in jewelry, then caught up. We wound up spending all our Kohl's Cash, and I was seriously disappointed. On the way home, she asked what kind of plans were being made for her birthday. I exploded, revisiting the resentment I have about my crappy birthday. After we got home, we managed to talk about it. I told her about my therapy session, and connected I feel right now. That I feel like I can maintain my current position on the gender spectrum. That I have been letting my leg hair grow for the last two weeks unabated. She told me that when I caught up with her in men's wear, she fully expected me to have a pair of earrings in hand, saying that I wished to purchase them. She said she wouldn't have had a problem with that. I wish she could have said it then. I'm so accustomed to being shot down that i don't even try anymore. I need an invitation. She still has no interest in shopping for me, but she says it's because she just generally hates to shop. Maybe the landscape is beginning to shift a little.

A typical New Year's Eve for us consists of some alcoholic drinks, homemade artichoke and spinach dip, and some rented movies. This year was no different. We watched (500) Days of Summer, which I have to say was near perfect. Zooey Deschanel is radiant. I started getting weepy toward the end, then I got up to read the tiny credits, while Mrs. L took some dishes upstairs. I especially wanted to see the music credits. One featured song was "Mushaboom" by Feist. She is a favorite of mine. She goes by Feist, but has a first name for writing credits: Leslie. I had forgotten that, and seeing it pushed me over the edge. The movie has such a sense of love lost, and then I'm reminded of what I've lost or stand to lose. When my wife came back downstairs, I had started crying.

We sat down together, and I shuddered and sobbed for a solid twenty minutes. I told her how much I love her, how I feel like I've tortured her the last two years. I said that I'm trying to be true to myself and be true to her, and finding the narrow strip where they meet is very hard. I talked about living for today, how I don't want to die knowing that I never lived in the way I wanted to. She held me tight through all this, while I soaked her sweater. When I had finished, she joked that this wasn't the activity that she had in mind when the film ended. Soon thereafter, we indulged in her plans. I'll just give you a broad, knowing wink, and let you figure out what that was.

That is as brief as I could make my tale. I started the new decade by emptying my heart and tear ducts on my partner. It's needed to be done for a long time. I'm glad I found a catalyst.