Queen of the Nerds - December 2000

And What Can We Do For You?

By Jamie Faye Fenton

Chief Technical Officer, Transgender Forum

One of my New Years resolutions is to improve Transgender Forum for its members and visitors. There are many possibilities, some simple and some complex. I would like to know which ideas you would prefer. I will start with a list, but I am open to whatever suggestions you have.

A threaded discussion bulletin board.
Usenet news archive for alt.transgendered, soc.support.transgendered, etc.
A search engine that covers external resources.
A recommendation engine that lets people review external resources and get recommendations.
A custom generated online catalog of goods and services tailored to your voluntary profile.
An e-mail edition sent to your mailbox each week.
Specialized views of our content for the different subcategories of our readership: one for cross-dressers, one for transsexuals, one for admirers, and so on.
A photo archive that can be searched and into which members can make contributions.
A searchable collection of transgender stories, like those in the "Nifty Transgender" archive.
An auction site for clothing, books, magazines, etc.
A scheduling and announcement service for a city to help groups of friends coordinate social activities.
Games.

So please write me and let me know what you're thoughts are. You can also post suggestions on our "Write from the Heart" page.

Cody

I spent time over the holidays with my parents, my sister, her daughters, and her daughter's children. The Chicago Zoo. I gave one of my sister's daughters a book entitled "Great Science Fiction Stories", edited by Cordelia Titcomb Smith (Dell, NY 1964).

It was written by my maternal grandmother -- who worked for many years as a librarian near Toledo, specializing in science fiction. She was a lifelong Democrat and an activist, one of the "Gray Panthers". The royalties from that book helped fund several international trips, including a visit to the Island of Tonga.

She never met Jamie, although so much of her lives on in me. I know she would cheer me on.

Julie

We spent some of our time in Chicago visiting with Julie Ann Johnson. Julie and I are both "Trains-gendered" ladies. Julie served as president of the Illinois Railway Museum for many years until she was forced to resign for being transgendered. She gave a poignant speech about this at Southern Comfort last year.Fortunately many of the people at the museum are warming up to her now. While many may initially fear us, often when they see that we are becoming happier, gentler beings, their hearts open.

Julie is both compassionate and generous. One of her recent projects is to endow "The TSELF Fund". The purpose of this is described in the press release from IFGE:

"The International Foundation for Gender Education (IFGE) would like to announce that it will be awarding numerous scholarships to transgender identified students in the helping and caring professions through it’s collaborative Transgender Scholarship and Education Legacy Fund (TSELF) in the United States and Canada. Each scholarship will provide supplemental funding for post-secondary students who have a demonstrated ability in and commitment to affecting change in the transgender communities through their commitment to working and being educated in the helping and caring professions. These include, but are not limited to, Social Services, Health Care, Religious Instruction (all denominations), Teaching and the Law. We seek to reflect a broad range of interests, including social services, HIV/AIDS education, law, teaching & education, religious instruction (all denominations), medical and health care as well as the sciences."

More information, including instructions for applying for a grant, are on their website: http://www.tself.org/.

Julie is busy doing the final proofing for a book she is editing called "By the Grace of God". This is an anthology of writings published in the late Lee Frances Heller's newsletters:"The Grace and Lace Letter" and "Christian Love Letters". These resources from the 1990s have helped many Christians come to terms with their transgender nature and so will this book.

Julie is going in for gender reassignment surgery in Portland later this month. We all wish her a speedy recovery and all the happiness that she so deserves.