So I was kind of a dumbass and I put off doing Hormone Replacement Therapy for, like, eight years after I came out. Some of those years I thought I was supposed to wait a couple years; some of those years I was in grad school and didn't want to deal with anyone's shit; but some of those years I was finally home and still dithering. Something about hormones possibly changing your personality, which, yeah, no shit, having the right set for once is bound to make someone happier and more confident.

What actually kicked me into gear on the whole thing was that by about age 27, I saw my thirties approaching, and I thought, oh no, I'm gonna have a five-o-clock shadow like Homer Simpson. I don't want to look like an old man. I want to look like an old lady!

An uncommon choice of appearance, but then, I can't look like a young lady forever, and I'm going to look like an old lady longer than I'll look like a young lady anyhow. (I think. My face has barely changed since I was fifteen.) More to the point, I want to look like someone that everyone thinks is a witch. I shall live in a crooked little stone house in the shadows of the gnarled boughs of old trees, and all the children in the neighborhood will say, don't go near that house, the old witch lives there!

As it happens, my eyes are a touch too lopsided, my chin a little too cleft, my nose too long and crooked to be especially feminine -- puberty ruined that possibility for me (and I shall never forgive it!). But I have a face that will be EXCELLENT for an old witch. I even have a nearly-impercetible little wart on the side of my nose!

Come come, have a bite of this apple. I promise it's not poisoned.