Still Dreaming

I definitely remembered this dream from last night.

In the dream, I had a girlfriend. These days, the only girlfriend I can get seems to be in my dreams. Anyway, in an unknown manner, she is slowly transforming me into a Japanese school girl. When I realize what she is doing, I protest, and she playfully tells me that if I can catch her, I can stop her.

I begin searching and chasing her all over Honolulu. Why the heck I am in Hawaii is never explained. All the while I slowly change into a Japanese school girl, becoming a young woman and having my clothes slowly morph into a school uniform. It's very bizarre.

I finally catch up to my girlfriend. She is on her motor scooter and is stopped at a busy intersection. I run into the street to confront her and demand that she change me back into a man. The only problem is that I now find my speech has been effected, and I can only speak English with a very pronounced Japanese accent.

Japanese is different from American English in that in English, foreign words usually retain the same pronunciation as practiced in their native tongue. In Japanese, foreign words are frequently modified in their pronunciation. Therefore when a Japanese speaker tries to use lots of English words, but pronounces them as they are written in Japanese, it is often confusing and useless to English speakers and listeners. That is how I find myself speaking in the dream. I know English, but must pronounce the words as if I have never spoken conversational English.

A group of young women pass by us and overhear the conversation. They call out helpful corrections to my speech as they pass by. I turn, bow, and thank them. Don't know if that is proper Japanese etiquette, but I did it in the dream. The girls laugh and continue on. Their behavior strikes me as odd, but when I turn to face my girlfriend again, she is gone.

I return home alone and enter my bedroom to find it has been decorated in typical high school girl fashion.

That's when I awoke. As I have written before, I think some dreams do have deep psychological meaning and are good for analysis. Then again, some dreams are just good entertainment, and I was thoroughly entertained by this one.

Kelli

On Being Lara Croft

Time for a quick strange dream update....


I have an iGoogle homepage that I enjoy very much. I've got some fashion news gadgets, weather and e-mail gadgets, and some cute artwork gadgets to keep me informed and entertained. It has a calendar and a calculator (which is never used), and a love thought for the day. I don't change the gadgets very often, but the iGoogle page is customizable with various themes, and I like to change the theme from time to time.


My current theme is a Lara Croft theme. Lara is a character from the Tomb Raider video game series. I have never played any of the Tomb Raider games (a fact many younger readers find hard to believe), but I have seen many pictures of Lara. She is a knock-out of a woman who likes action and adventure and could easily kick my tail if I were to meet her in person. Beautiful, a state often identified as feminine, and tough, a state often identified as male, when combined in one person is certain to attract my eye every time.


Lately, I have not been sleeping well, and was extra tired when I went to bed last night. I dreamed last night that I was Lara Croft. Not being familiar with the various Tomb Raider storylines, the dream was mostly various action adventure scenes in which I, as Lara Croft, found myself racing cars, diving off boats, hang gliding, and such. I had a blast in the dream and awoke somewhat out of breath.


Some folks have criticized the Lara Croft character as being an imaginary character whose looks are unattainable for the average woman. The average woman is unable to attain Lara's beauty. The average woman is unable to have shapely legs like Lara. The average woman would find it difficult to daily manage life with a figure like Lara's body dimensions. I feel I can now safely say that I just spent a night as Lara Croft, and had no problem with my breasts getting in my way.


Kelli

On A Scale of Feminine to Feminine

Many, many moons ago, a very wise man (my therapist) suggested I keep a personal journal. I found the idea a bit silly and asked if he meant the sort of journal where I would write things like "Dear Diary, today the little red-haired girl smiled at me from across the room"? He said that was exactly the sort of journal he was referring to, that it would help me work through my thoughts and feelings, and would prove very beneficial. Although it was many, many years ago (practically the dark ages), I remember it like it was almost yesterday. I wanted to be cured of my transvestism (used more like a blanket term back in those days), blood letting and leeches did no good, and if my neighbors ever discovered my horrible secret, they would chase me out of town with torches and pitchforks.

So I started writing a journal and have continued doing so to this very day. I have found it therapeutic, extremely helpful, entertaining, and enlightening. From time to time, I review entries in this journal. For example, in December I will often glance at entries dated December from years past. Sometimes I make strange discoveries, like finding I feel completely different today than I did about some event ten years ago. Sometimes I come across really important items that I had lost track of or forgotten. It's even helped with personal relationships with family and friends over the years as my life sometimes plays like a soap opera.

I'll write about important things, work, family and friends, church, mundane things like where I live or visit on a daily basis. My journal also contains records of my actual dreams, my "crossdreaming", crossdressing, etc. It's been fun, educational, and very helpful to me and I always encourage others to try it.

So I was recently reviewing an old journal entry from about a year ago when I also came across an entry in Jack Molay's awesome blog about masculinity and femininity. My ex-girlfriend always accused me, Kelli, of being hyper-feminine and very girly-girly. I was shocked when she told me because although I like all things feminine, I had always tried to be just the "girl next-door" type. I've known crossdressers who were into little girl-type clothes, extremely frilly and lacy-type clothes, square-dance clothes with lots of petticoats, etc. I just wanted to look pretty in jeans and a shirt, and wanted to do so with as little effort and work as possible (latter part of that statement is still very much a work in progress). It took me a long time -- probably because I was born male -- to realize that there is a very broad area of play on my scale of feminine to feminine.

I think if and when I attain a level of satisfaction in presenting myself as Kelli, no one will notice. I want to look just like any other woman you see in the mall, at the grocery store, working in an office, etc. In my current attempts to reach this level, it is fairly easy to see that I am actually a guy although I have passed on several ocassions. Still, I dress and do my best to act like a normal woman. That is the area on the feminine to feminine scale that I try to cover.

My ex-girlfriend was a wonderful person, sweet, funny, and pretty. I found her to be all the woman a guy could ever want. I would consider her to be a normal woman, fitting perfectly centered in the feminine to feminine scale. However, she was at least a couple of inches taller than me, several pounds heavier than me, and to her surprise, stronger than me. Had we gotten married, she would have carried me over the threshold. I never thought of myself as looking weak or a "sissy", but looking back at the two of us standing side by side, she was definitely the masculine one in the relationship.

I always felt bad about that because I realized I was the one that was throwing the whole feminine to feminine scale off balance. While I denied acting hyper-feminine, I have to confess to acting feminine. My girlfriend by herself was feminine. My girlfriend next to me was masculine (or less feminine than normal). Me by myself was fairly masculine. Me by my girlfriend was less than masculine (or more feminine, which I could take as a compliment).

It's all somewhat illogical and confusing. It was also not fair to my ex because as I said, she was a wonderful, beautiful woman.

Masculinity and femininity are obviously sliding scales. That point was finally driven home to me in a dream one night. In the dream, I had to travel to a foreign country to meet a king. Before meeting the king, I met with people from his court who advised me on protocol. My basic manners were good enough, but my mode of dress was all wrong. My Sunday suit and tie just wouldn't do, so one of the staff gave me a royal gown suitable for my presentation to the king. I was pushed behind a dressing screen and told to put it on. When I started to put it on, I noticed what it looked like and started to complain. It looked like a white, one-piece nylon dress with a skirt that came to about the knees.

The staff told me there was no mistake and to hurry. I said there was a mistake as the dress had a skirt. The head servant said in that country it was their version of the kilt, and not to worry as that was not the entire suit of clothes. I put on the garment, matching tights, clunky shoes that had very high heels for male shoes, and left the dressing screen.

The staff were unanimous in their approval and proceeded to finish dressing me. I was given a white, powdered wig and a makeup artist came and lightened my facial skin with powder and makeup. A wide, black belt cinched me in at the waist, jeweled adornments were pinned to my chest, and a black bolero jacket finished things off. I asked to see a mirror just as another person who was about to be presented to the king entered the room. He was huge, well over six feet tall, with a bodybuilder physique that I thought was going to tear through the royal clothes he was wearing. His outfit seemed to be identical to mine, but the staff did not have a mirror at hand and I was unable to see myself.

We were both presented to the king, and afterwards escorted to a waiting chamber next to the throne room in case the king had further need of us. I and this huge bodybuilder guy sat in a couple of chairs with a dainty little tea table between us and quietly made small talk. A few other folks were in the room and I began to notice them and how they were similarly dressed. I noticed a young man and woman sitting across the room from us and started to smile at them when I realized something horrible -- the young woman and man across the room were actually our reflections in a large mirror. This guy was so big and beefy and I was so... uh... me... uh... not big and beefy, that from a distance we looked like a man and woman.

I awoke from the dream and wrote it down in my journal as it was definitely one of the stranger dreams I have ever experienced. Still, I think I learned something important from it: If I'm ever going to completely be Kelli, it would really help if I lived someplace that was predominantly populated by big beefy bodybuilding guys. I think future girlfriends and/or wife might appreciate that too.

Kelli Y

Glass Closets

I've mentioned before that I find dreams very interesting. I seem to have a fairly active dream life (in technicolor, no less) and have often found them very helpful. Depending on the subject matter, I can observe a problem in waking life, go to sleep, and dream a solution. I've had dreams that were purely entertaining, and I have had dreams that seemed to deal with personal obstacles and problems. Some dreams I was actually able to interpret into meaningful insights on my life, and some dreams still remain a mystery to me.

Several years ago, I found myself facing the same question from three different sources. At the time, I had a girlfriend (now an ex-), became involved in a local cross dressing group, and was seeing a therapist. I became involved in the cross dressing group about the same time I began seriously dating my girlfriend. When I felt I had no choice, I came out to my girlfriend about Kelli and later began therapy sessions about my cross dressing.

I need to add here that I have always been, and still am, in the closet about my TGism. I was originally silent on the subject because of fear, but as I've aged and been around the block a few times, I'm not really interested in the whole world knowing about Kelli. I seem to have no problems with Kelli and other TG friends, and no problems with Kelli and therapists. Kelli and girlfriends/family seem to be another matter.

That leaves my male side (referred to as "Kelly" here) for girlfriends (even when they know Kelli) and family. I was confident that folks I didn't want to introduce to Kelli didn't know anything about her. That confidence was shattered by my TG friends, therapist, and ex-girlfriend. About the same time, the same conversation came up with all three about whether or not they knew anything about Kelli. For example, my ex-girlfriend knew me as "Kelly", but after I introduced her to Kelli she told me that she knew something was up -- that something was different about me. I knew my therapist for several years as a friend before I began seeing him for Kelli. He told me he knew I was "different" and wasn't really surprised to meet Kelli.

That led me to wonder what I had done to tip them off. True I'm not an overly testosteroned, beer-gutted, skirt-chasing, can't hold a conversation without mentioning a favorite sports team, type of guy, but then I am definitely not the "metrosexual" type either. I have a tough time deciding between going fishing and having my nails done.

I worried quite a bit. Although my ex-girlfriend knew, I hadn't told my family about Kelli. My ex-girlfriend was having enough problems about her, and I knew my family would completely freak. I made a mental note to try to act more manly around these folks, but really didn't know what actions, male or female, were giving me away.

Then I had this crazy dream.... In the dream, I had gone to visit my parents. I found myself in my old room, which looked completely normal, but I was now a woman. I had a feminine hairdo, a pretty face, and a figure that I would be willing to kill for if there was ever a chance I could actually get it!!! It's okay... I'm calm... breathe deeply.... Anyway, I was dressed for bed (wearing a babydoll nightie, of all things!) and in bed, reading a book. The door to my closet was open, and it was full of dresses, blouses, and cute shoes. My old desk was now covered in make-up and hair care items. There was a knock on the door and Mom entered my room. She sat on the edge of my bed and said, "Kelly [addressed me as a male], I need to ask you an important and personal question. Are you a cross dresser?" I found myself gasping and sitting upright as I awoke from the dream.

That silly dream made a big impression on me regarding what people think of me. I can't help what other people think of me. I could do my best to act macho for those who don't know Kelli, but then they wouldn't know Kelly either. All they would know was some person trying to imitate someone he/she wasn't. I'm lazy, so I'll keep it simple -- I'll let people love or hate me for who I am. Kelli is a big part of me, and you will see a bit of her in Kelly. Kelly is a big part of me, and you will see a bit of him in Kelli. I'm doing better on combining these two aspects of my life, and I'm feeling much better by doing that.

And on the subject of who knows and who doesn't know about Kelli, at the moment, everyone that I want to know about Kelli knows. For those who think they know, it's up to them whether they want to approach me on the subject or not. Trying to read minds gives me nothing but a headache.

Strange Dream Time, 3/28/2010

I love dream analysis. Many modern scientists and doctors laugh at the thought of dreams being important, but history contradicts them in this belief. The Bible is full of dreams that had great significance. People regarded dreams as omens or messages from "beyond" well into the late nineteenth century when psychology began to emerge as a legitimate science. I've always enjoyed reading the theories of Freud and Jung and still find their brand of thought and analysis relevant.

Dreams can be fun. They can be scary. They can have deep psychological meaning. They can help you overcome problems and obstacles you face in your daily life. But I have found that the most important thing to remember about dreams is this: Dreams can also be nothing more than entertainment for our minds. That dream you had once about eating hot dogs might have a psychological meaning, or it might be the simple result of you overeating before bedtime.

I've had many dreams that dealt with my transgenderism. Most of them were pleasant although I have awaken from a few and found myself sitting upright in my bed, drenched in a pool of sweat as if I had been physically running from horrible monster. Overall, I've been surprised out how mundane many of my TG dreams have been, whether they have had any sort of meaning or not.

Last night, I had a TG dream.

In the dream, I was asked to take part in a womanless beauty pageant. Oddly enough, in waking life, I have never taken part in such a production. In the dream, I was "drafted" by friends who didn't know anything about Kelli. I found myself in the odd position of trying to masculinize myself. I put off meeting with my "beauty consultant team" for as long as possible to give my body hair more time to grow back and appear more manly. I feigned ignorance with makeup and female clothing. I worked hard to keep people out of my home as I had a few too many feminine articles of dress laying about for a single guy. I took a look at the outfits my sponsors had picked out, immediately decided what I would do to look my best in them, and then did my best not to look my best. I was afraid to look like Kelli. For once, I wanted to look like a guy in a dress.

The day of the pageant arrived. I found myself putting on last minute touches (and trying not to overdo it) while the stage director hurried us onto the stage. For the first number, we were arranged like a choir for the opening musical number. I guess we didn't rehearse (dream scripting and timeline problems) and I found myself surrounded by several contestants who were much shorter than me due to their age. (In flats, I'm about normal height for a woman.) We sang the non-descript song with much energy and I constantly found myself really getting into the role and needed to remind myself I'm suppose to be a guy, not a girl.

Unfortunately, that's when I awoke.

Kelli's amateur dream interpretation: A dream strictly for entertainment purposes. Enjoy it, laugh about it, blog and record it if desired, but no major revelations or concerns to note.

Kelli