Getting better at the school thing.

The Writing Theatre classroom is still my bête noire. It makes me super sleepy every damned time. I am really worried that my teachers think I find them incredibly boring, or that I just don’t have my shit together, or whatever. I do a lot of yawning in that damned room. Too much for them to think it’s sarcasm, I suppose. But still, I worry.

More importantly, it means I spend the whole time stressed and miserable. I can’t concentrate, let alone appreciate the content of the course. I want to be alert and focused, not fighting sleep the whole time and getting super stressed out.

I assume it has to do with the fact that it’s a room with poor ventilation and a lot of people breathing in it. There was a classroom at UPEI that had the same effect on me. Every class I had there, I spent the whole time fighting to stay awake. It had no windows (being in the basement) and yet it had seating for thirty students, plus the prof.

I hate rooms like that. I take ventilation very, very seriously.

And I don’t know what I can do about it, to be honest. I crack the window near me every chance I can get, and that helps (which supports my ventilation theory). I would open it up further, but it’s a window that will not stay open on its own and all I have to prop it open is a whiteboard eraser.

I will have to rack my brains in order to think of something bigger I can bring and/or find to open it more. I need air, dammit. My sleep apnea gives me oxygen issues even under the best of conditions. Sitting in a dark closed box (did I mention that the place has thick black curtains to keep the light out?) is not compatible with my health, let alone my staying awake.

I wonder if any of my fellow students have the same problem. It doesn’t seem like they would, because they are all young and thin and healthy. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t bugging people. Perhaps I will complain to the higher ups and see what happens.

At the very least, I might get official permission to open the windows wide when I come in, and someone may know how to get them to stay that way.

This morning’s class was Script Structure, taught by Brian (guess where?). It wasn’t bad. If I had been alert during it, I probably would have enjoyed it more. The homework for next week is to read the script for The Crying Game and do the Seven Pillars thing with it.

I’ve never seen the movie, so I am looking forward to reading it.

I only know the song :

I was pondering my own particular flavour of gender dysphoria today. It was seeing a nanny comforting a crying child that set me off. I really envy that nanny. I want to be in her position…. caring, nurturing, comforting… without any worries that someone will think they are a pervert or be scared by them or otherwise judge them as doing wrong by their gender.

Like I have said before, I have never felt like I was in the wrong gendered body. But there have been times I wished I was a woman not because that would be the “right fit” but because I feel like they can express what I want to express and play the role I want to play.

Women don’t realize how lucky they are to have being supported by a man as an option. I would love to be a housewife, with some little ones to take care of. I would be an amazing mother. Granted, seeing as I am a gay man in his forties, the little ones would probably be cats, not babies, but still. I have a strong desire to care for and be there for little critters of one sort or another.

I have so much love to give.

My therapist pointed out that I don’t need to be a woman to do all those things. And he’s probably right. Perhaps if I was more active in the gay community (hard to imagine being less active), I would meet other maternal men who could act as role models for me and show me how to be all that I want to be without having to go to the extreme.

That seems like the ideal outcome. I am happy being male in body and biology. I love my penis. So I would hate to have to leave my maleness behind in order to express my femaleness. Either way, I would be denying half of myself.

Right now, all I have in the way of gender identity is “somewhere in between”. Part of me says “Why do you need a gender identity at all? Just be you!”, which is noble and quite in keeping with Western individualism, but it’s not that easy. People need to know who they are.

Some of us don’t even know what we are.

The afternoon class was Character. We had a brief terminology quiz at the beginning of class. As usual, I had totally forgotten this was going to happen, but everyone was studying for it in the lounge during lunch and quizzing each other on it out loud, so I ended up studying by osmosis.

We’re learning the Hero’s Journey now, and I have to say that it doesn’t seem nearly as impressive now as it did when I was watching Bill Moyers interview Joeseph Campbell about it on PBS back in the 80’s. Perhaps that’s because back then, it was being presented at a fascinating set of insights into the universal human story and not as something I am supposed to be applying to real world writing.

A lot of it seems like hooey to me now, or at least, not as big a deal as it once seemed.

But I will learn it, partly because it’s interesting, but mostly because apparently, according to my profs, the Seven Pillars and the Twelve Steps of the Hero’s Journey (the first one is admitting you have a problem) are used as the common lingo of writing for entertainment, so I had better know WTF people are talking about.

Anyhow, that’s my day, folks.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.