Independence day

The first email I opened this morning informed me that I had won £1,500,000 on the Swiss lottery. Yeah right, cos I never forget to buy my Swiss lotto tickets…

Bastards. I sent it on to a scam-reporting site saying, "Please find these people and throw them in jail". I read one story of a couple involved in a similar scam, who when trying to withdraw £20,000 were advised by the bank that they were being conned & they would never see this money again (supposedly needed to facilitate the release of "funds"). They refused to believe even the police who told them the same, but fortunately they were dissuaded from parting with their life savings at the last minute.

Anyway such is the world today. What about my little world…? Well, no sooner had I got back from Sparkle when I received a call out of the blue from a very old friend who I hadn’t seen for 3 or 4 years, asking me if I’d like to join her and her boyfriend for the day at a forthcoming local music festival. Just a little one, this is only a little place. When you haven’t spoken to someone for 3 or 4 years there is sooo much to catch up on, and somehow it didn’t seem appropriate to tell them the really important news. It’s not easy at the best of times, but over the phone I just don’t think I can do it. So, I emailed her and said I would love to go but there is something I’d better tell them first…

The little imp inside me would quite liked to have surprised them, just to see the look on their faces, but no, these are people who I care about and it’s not fair to shock people like that. Having agreed to go, it then struck me what I was about to do. Still only close friends and family know about my situation, even though I’m not actually hiding it any more. In the past I have probably been on stage or in the studio with every other musician in this town, so there was the potential for a lot of old faces to be present at such a local festival. Would they recognise me, could they miss me whilst I was tagging along with a somewhat larger than life character who had also been involved in the music scene? Would I be the talk of the town the next day? It’s not that I would really mind if I was, but I don’t believe in making life hard for myself, so I’m just trying to be a little discreet, keep life as quiet as possible for the time being at least, let things progress a little before becoming a bit more "in your face". I must admit it did get me thinking; one can’t fully appreciate the ins and outs of transitioning until one actually does it…

Anyway into the unknown I stepped, a local festival for local people, thousands of them in fact, not as little as I’d expected, but I’d wager I was the only TS present. I counted 7 people who walked past who I would normally have spoken to, they didn’t seem to recognise me, (have I changed so much?) one even sat next to us and chatted to my friend. It was a guy I’d known for years but hadn’t seen for ages, my band played at his wedding reception and we were good mates for a long time, so I would have quite liked to have talked to him. But then again I didn’t really want to get into all that so I kept quiet, and he sat next to me for 5 minutes without noticing who I was, or hopefully what I was. There were others who walked by, just a few feet away, who I haven’t seen in only a few months, they didn’t notice me either. I think that keeping a low profile is one of my strong points. Had I stood up and said hello no doubt they would have, well, fallen over probably.

It was great day; nice, but slightly weird to be out in my home town like that. We went to three pubs later in the evening (so far I’ve only been out shopping in the daytime here) which was even weirder. My god, Kendal girls have to be seen to be believed (not in a good way) and here I was, one of them…

Kendal pubs can also be quite an experience, like the one in a 2-up 2-down terrace, the 2-down being the public bar and the toilet, both rooms together considerably smaller than my front room, which isn’t exactly big. We went into a fairly new bar which appeared to be a converted corridor, 2 tables one small bar and a 5-inch dartboard (really). The 3 of us half-filled the place, until a few minutes later a party of about 25 young, glamorous, good-looking girls came in. Oh my god. It was wall to wall with beautiful young women, plus me and my 2 friends. Scary. I did my best not to be noticed.

I managed to get back in time to see the last few acts on Live-8. Pink Floyd really were better without Roger Waters; they had a better bass player and we didn’t have to listen to his miserable, manic-depressive, atonal vocals. But it was a cool gig just the same.

IPL tomorrow, 3^rd session, so I’m unshaven and in hiding. Time of the month…

Pippa seems to have fixed her bike so I’m hoping for a visit this weekend. I suppose I’d better do some housework. My finger is still quite sore, I can bend it more but not grip, it hurts if I try to use it. My left hand has always been quite useless but I am going to have to get used to using it for such joyous tasks as dusting and hoovering and polishing…

xx