MEOW
We have our monitor program going now! About 10 transgender forum subscribers have already volunteered to serve as our guardians, working to keep our chat room relatively free from rude people.
While our chat rooms have always tended to be more like support group meetings than singles bars, we have had our share of trouble with disruptive individuals. Anyone who has ever used an amateur radio repeater or a citizens band radio know the type: a loser who gets their kicks from annoying everyone else. Many years of experience has taught that the only way to handle jerks like this is to completely ignore them. Our monitor program will make this easier for everyone.
The MEOW software is continuing to be improved. I recently invented a new way to connect the browser to the server and we are testing it out in the lab. We also have applied for several grants to improve the program and make it available for other educational ndeavors. Our next user community to adopt MEOW is called PatchWorx. This is a virtual community of children who are confined to hospitals. I will have more details on this after we get up and running.
Dancing
People who have met me at transgender conventions quickly discover that I love going dancing more than anything else. I am as big a fool as you can be: I have been known to dance to beeping sounds coming out of cash registers in the supermarket!
Like most children, I was taught structured dances in school, but really didn't like them. In college I found that I enjoyed doing improvisational dancing, but never pursued it -- It never really felt right dancing as a man.
When I finally figured out that I was transgender, I discovered how much I enjoy moving my body while I am wearing feminine clothing. From meeting and making many friends in the transgender community, I know that I am not alone in this interest.
Denae Doyle, who works as a feminine image consultant in the Bay Area, led a seminar at the recent Southern Comfort Convention on feminine movement. Unlike most instruction in this area which tends to jump right into walking and gestures, Denae starts off with dancing.
The idea is to help everyone let go of their male-selves. Each participant is encouraged to dance by herself, rather than paying attention to everyone else. The dance moves are from basic belly dancing and Tai Chi, swaying your hands and rolling your hips.
The results were incredible. Everyone was able to get in touch with their "inner woman" and find grace and balance in a natural way with much less direct instruction.
Denae received many complementary and encouraging comments from the participants and will be using this technique again.
So why do many transgender people love to dance? One evening I felt a clue, it just jumped into my head. For thousands of human generations, the role of transgender people in tribal cultures was to lead ceremonies by dancing. A natural ability to dance evolved right alongside the genetic triggers for being transgendered. During the last 100 generations, with the rise of the kingdom and religions based on coercion, our ceremonial role (and our very existence) has been brutally suppressed.
Fortunately things are finally changing: Now we can dance again and that is what I was born to do.