My new town is very much my own territory now and have been around most of it dressed , no man's land lies between my new town and my old and an area beyond where we have another social group but my old home town is very much enemy territory because of my wife . I haven't told the story on the forum but some very old mutual friends let us both down and now my wife doesn't want to see me or speak to me again .
Today my art group was having a private viewing of the new exhibition before opening to the public on Monday , I made a few suggestions beforehand that if I joined them it might be as Teresa, now this is obviuosly a BIGGY for me ! To go back to my home town for the second time dressed but this time in broad daylight and also to let my class see me in reality , some have seen pictures . I was really blowing hot and cold over this one but my final decision came down to my future intentions , as I would like to get my own art group up and running . Maybe it's wishful thinking but if I could set one up it would be great to eventually stage our own exhibition , to achieve that as Teresa will need some confidence to put myself in the forefront of that situation .
So how did it go ? Well it was incredible , I had some time to kill so walked along the busy High Street to check out a few charity shops and struck lucky with a nice selection of clippon earrings . I finally entered the Art Centre , at first no one spoke because they didn't recognise me , well after I broke the ice with my group tutor it all went so well , everyone was very accepting even the older guy who told me beforehand that he couldn't handle it . I had several conversation with the female members about outfits and makeup because they were surprised how I looked . A lady then came out to me on behalf of two TG friends she knew in my old town , she made it clear that she defends us with every bone in her body and told me in no uncertain terms where bigots deserved to be sent . A younger member told me she had seen me across the gallery and wondered who the pretty lady was not realising it was the guy who sits opposite her painting the big canvases . She couldn't get over it, in fact when the question arose of how I would present myself after the Summer break they were unanimous in saying come dressed !
I will add that the exhibtion gallery was being shared by all the art groups that use the centre so the room also had artists and guests I hadn't met before , well now I have some new friends from across the groups with invites to join them as Teresa .
Again I would have regretted it so much if I had chickened out , I had to take advantage of this opportunity , don't know if and when it might have occured again . So now I have created the problem of being consistent in my appearance with them , I'm just going to remind you all that my mother does help out at the Art centre , she does know about my Cding now but may not be comfortable bumping into me . Ok I did take the chance of visiting the cinema dressed which went well . The other problem is do I totally ingore my wife's objections and risk someone she knows seeing me and passing it on to her ? The stack up ended when she put the phone down on me after I told her the problem was she had lost control over me . That I believe is more of a problem to her than my CDing if she were to be totally honest with me .
Since we separated I feel I have to take control and not back down , she knows the score , I did point out that I'm not hiding to please her because at the end of the day it really isn't making any difference . She then waved her ace card by reminding me about our grandsons , I see it now that she is creating more of a problem out of that and even manipulating the situation . If she was OK about we could all work round the problem that she is creating as much as she accuses me of .