The Wall Crossers

Jan 2000 - Transitioning to Barbara

Barbara's perspective

I was born in September. Leida was born in September. So I was "born near her". She called me brave... gentle. We spoke together in the language of stars (our poetry to each other). We fulfilled the prophesy of the stars that was given to her by Frau Elisabeta: born near you, brave but gentle in the language of the stars.

Leida was a lesbian. She accepted me as a lesbian. Many people could not understand such a thing, but when I told her When two bodies join, they find a way to make it work, Leida understood, and we found a way to make it work.

We should have had forever love. Frau Elisabeta had said to me, the only time I ever talked with her, by phone, Every second an eternity. As I think right now about the loss of our forever love, I cry for five eternities... (second)... (second)... (second)... (second)... (second)... And still the tears come, relentlessly.

But if Florian is correct—Florian who e-mailed me two years ago, February 1998, and told me of a granddaughter born the year before, to Leida and me—if this Florian is correct, then another part of the prophesy was fulfilled: we had a child together.

Where is this child? Where is Leida? They are both on the other side of a wall—a wall of impossibilities.

September is a transition month—transitioning from summer to fall. For the past two years, I have lived only in September—transitioning to a girl named Barbara.

When I got that e-mail from Florian, I came out... as Barbara—she of my childhood. Why did I choose to be Barbara? Why not Olivia?

Because the warrior girl spirit of Olivia had left again. I approached transitioning tentatively, with little support. I was alone. I had become a girl with no spirit.

My family at first were shocked... when I told them. But then, (second)... (second)... (second)... warfare settled in—rejection.

Leida had accepted me, so readily. Her Vati too.

Prasa. The Indian woman from my workplace in Berlin. She was wise. Everyone listened to her. That day, the girls' lunch, when Barb questioned my gender claim. A debate among my co-worker girls ensued. Barb finally threw to me her challenge, And how can we prove that you are a girl?

Prasa, who had been quietly listening, spoke, saying, You prove a person is a girl by accepting the fact that, if you ask her 'Are you a girl?', and then if she should answer 'Yes', then she is a girl. She then looked me and asked, Corporal Reary, are you a girl?

And when I replied Yes to her, she confidently stated, Then I say this truth: Olivia, you are a girl, and we accept you as the girl you are.

Prasa had put the matter to rest.

Why can I not get that respect now, from co-workers, friends, family? Why can't we put this matter to rest?

Maybe Leida and I did not have forever love. Maybe we had to settle for a greater love—a love that is yet to be... for us.

Leida, I should have crossed the Wall for you. You should have crossed the Wall for me. We lost each other, but was ours merely a sacrifice for some greater love?

Will I ever truly understand what happened all those years ago? Will I ever understand who I was and who I might have been?

And now? Leida is long gone, though I can never forget her. Nor how could I ever forget that Frau Elisabeta's other prophesy may have come true? 2025... (second)... (second)... (second)...? How can I wait for that, through those eternities?

With no hope, no support from family, none from my high technology workplace, none from most friends, I felt abandoned. I am deserted, now, two years later. I have lost them all. When I switched from AOL, I also lost the Chaitin e-mail, the Florian e-mail. I don't care. I am falling like an elevator into another place—into another person... again.

The stars shower me with fears.

The landscape is eerie—I'm in my own personal tragedy—my recurring combat zone. Figures approach me—they are my hopes and dreams of ever knowing... them—those ones I have such desperate longing for.

Because of rainbow skies, I did not face the truth.

Because of misplaced love, I squandered most of my time... in Berlin, with Anja. The one who, Yes, eventually did kiss me and then left me, and, really, damaged me the most.

Because of the light of stars, I see them, though dimly, through my starlight scope: my hopes and dreams of ever resolving all the questions, over there... of ever being accepted, for who I am, over here.

September is over. But a winter plodding through a forest thicket trace has arrived for me... cold... a cold desolate path. I am freezing to death.

I see them giving up their beckoning, now turning. I see them, now oh so very far away, backs to me.

I pull the trigger. I return to that stark, locked, empty room.