Build Me a Woman

Build Me A Woman, a song by The Doors, on the Absolutely Live album. Yeah I was a fan of Jim Morrison back then. That one though was a Ray Manzarek song, probably a cover of an old Blues song idk actually, but Ray was singing it. It's a song that was part of my regular refs back then and as we my friend and I, two male teens were desperatly trying to cope with an influx of hormones were fooling around with ideas and joking I put up the proposition that we could build ourselves a woman. We had a laugh as the idea was apealing, calling on us to sort out what would be the features we'd choose, and instantly we disagreed so that's as far as it went: a big laugh, and we moved on to other teen ideas or smoked a joint idk, can't remember details. For some time after, it remained a running joke between us two that the others around didn't get. But actually it was my friend joking on this with the typical exagerations a male teen would paint the subject with that made me back off from that idea in the first place. So for him, it was kind of a carricature, a joke, like comedia d'el arte idk... I was never at ease when he joked on that for it was a serious idea I had put forward, not a joke.

I didn't know in what way exactly it was, though. Serious... I remember it was confusing at the time. Let's say it troubled me, in the way that I knew this was something near a genius find but I didn't know how... in what way even.

Then I kind of forgot about that as life went on, jobs, etc. And I saw him less often too. 

Anyways some 15 years later I'm in a Balzac class at University (yeah, I'm a late bloomer academically) and, I don't remember the book I was working on, the subject of the class or anything, all I remember is I found it was a great idea to start my essay like that: the idea that we could build a woman. I remember being quite unsure of what I was doing but it did have a link with the writings of Balzac, and the professor actually thought my essay started in a great fashion... but failed to buckle the loop and got to nothing at the end. So I had a mediocre result for that paper and asked to meet him to dicuss it, but I again failed in my explanation to link my initial great idea to anything and my mark remained the same.

That's almost forty years ago and I remember meeting P.N. in his office. He did aknowledge that I seem to have something to express but that I wasn't quite able to give birth to it, neither in writing nor orally.

I wasn't able to see the idea through and I forgot about that again for more another 15 years.

But the fact that idea remained with me is significant, I mean I met professors many times in my six years at university and most of them meetings are totally vague in my mind, but not this one.

I did think back about all this when I first admitted to myself that I'm a trans woman, in 2009, so 17 years ago. So this story goes by about 15 years jumps.

That's what it was. I finally was able to express what I couldn't in 1991 nor when I was teen. I'm the woman to be built, I needed to build me as a woman. And so I did...

Transsexualism was really not in the air back then, I didn't pick this idea from anyone, any book or movie, nowhere. I didn't dream to be a woman, I just was a woman. All this time.

I remember in 2009 when I gave a thought to this idea, realizing that my transsexualism was the end result of this idea I had intrinsically without any information as a 16 year old, it was... like the Grand Canyon opening before my feet. I was in my forties, had lost 30 years. It made me very sad that I had not picked up before what it meant, that all this time was lost and... forever lost. It's not easy to transition in your forties, less again in your fifties as I finally did.

So I built me a woman, she's me. She's unperfect as I never could picture that woman I wanted to create in my mind. So I never tried to follow any model, I just went with the feel. The feel of a woman without any specific code followed: I don't wear and dislike earrings. Why is it that a woman has to have her ears pierced? Would that make me a woman? No. I never wear any make up, I pluck my darker face hair though, and shave, but no make up, no mascara... Would that make me a woman? No. It would make me look like a man wanting to look like a woman...

To be continued.

Dominique Rock