Confessions of a Prairie Bitch Read Online Free PDF Page B

expensive.”
    I was ecstatic. “Wow! That is so cool!”
    I hardly think that was the response they expected, but it was cool. This strange thing they were describing with such discomfort was nothing short of a miracle. I knew I was living in what was quickly becoming an age of scientific wonder; I had just recently seen men walk on the surface of the moon, right there on TV in my own living room. And now they were telling me of yet another astounding scientific triumph. This was cause for celebration!
    Of course, I didn’t really grasp the implications of Christine’s sex change. I also wasn’t clear about whether or not one could have multiple operations and just go back and forth, from gender to gender, as one needed. I thought that a person could then, by logical extension, have surgery to become anything : a monkey, a giraffe…a fire engine. But what I did get was the underlying principle: a person was no longer permanently defined by the circumstances of his or her birth. Biology was no longer destiny. I had no real desire to become male at that time, and so far, the female thing has really worked out for me. But all my life, I have known, deep in my heart, that if it didn’t, I knew my options. Because of this realization, I feel that I am, and have always been, a woman by choice.
    As fabulous as this news was, I had no idea what I was supposed to do the next time I saw Christine. It seemed rude to ask. I knew she’d written a book; I figured I’d eventually just go get a copy and read it. But now I couldn’t help staring at her. I’m not sure what I was looking for. A seam running up the back? Bolts in the neck? A zipper? In my cartoon-addled mind, I thought perhaps it would be something like when Bugs Bunny just unzips his head and becomes something else. There were no signs. Whatever the medical technology at the time the procedure was performed in Denmark, they must have really been on to something, or the doctor was having a very good day. I’ve seen pictures of her over the years, and she really did look fabulous.
    This is why I find it odd now, that with all the medical advances in the last forty years, there are still transsexuals who settle for less than top-drawer results. I swear, there’s no pride in workmanship anymore. When asked by a transsexual friend what I think of her new look, I am all too often forced to admit: “I knew Christine Jorgensen, and you, sir, are no Christine Jorgensen.”

CHAPTER THREE
    KEEPING SECRETS
OLGA: My grandma says you can tell what’s inside a person by the face they wear.
MARY: I guess. I never thought of Nellie that way, I mean, being poor and all. It kind of makes me feel sorry for her…almost.
    I ’m all for a change of scenery now and then; out with the old, in with the new. But when I was growing up, my parents barely let me unpack my stuffed animals before we were on to the next locale. I’m not really sure why we moved so much, but I think it had something to do with money. Being actors, our family income varied wildly from year to year. And being actors, we were cursed with a constant sense of misplaced optimism. If we came into a little extra money, my father would say, “Oh no, we can’t live here !” and we’d move somewhere much nicer and more expensive. And then, a year to two later, when the money ran out, and no jobs came in, we’d pack up and move to “something more practical.” We sometimes stayed as long as three years, sometimes less than one.
    When I was born, my family lived in Queens, New York, in a two-bedroom in Kew Gardens. We moved when I was a year old to Eighty-third Street and East End Avenue in Manhattan. My dad got a job on Broadway in the show Luther with Albert Finney, so this apartment building was ritzier; it had a doorman. Two years later, we were at the Chateau in Los Angeles.
    Obviously, all our apartments were rentals. My parents did not own a home until Auntie Marion left them hers when she died in 1985. They