h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Marv, try spending time with your friend, in their new gender role, under lots of different circumstances. Do something normally masculin, say, a hockey game. Do you share a Church? Sit together at a service. The more you do together the more information you'll have about your feelings. If the weirdness is just background noise you'll desensitize.

Mrs. Mac, who is much more organized than I am, just gave me a Hitchhicker's Guide themed birthday cake. I really have turned 42.

Happy Birthday, Mac! Are you really 42?

Marv, I agree with Mac. The best gift you can give a friend is the gift of your time freely shared. How far things have come since Jan Morris!

*as the sound of Chloe vacuuming can be heard several rooms away, the bots remove the partitions to reveal changes in the atelier*

http://www.asterlil.com/h2g2/aplannew.htm

[checking the workshops]
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Mac - happy b-day

Marv - I would say do what you are doing .... just be with your friend as you would normally .... if you out for some reason, work it through with your friend .... in the end it's the friendship and trust that count.

Lil - great update .... I can't wait to start playing in the computer area

Courtesy

Lil, might the other students and I have a nice, quiet room for study and occasional outbursts of academic frustration? I know Tonks will appreciate it. And I've got more writing to do than a monk copying Aquinas' Summa.

Marv, it's always hard to transition from one gender to another. Start trying to catch yourself calling her "him" or by her male name. Ask her to remind you to use her new name, and refer to her in the feminine pronoun. It's natural to slip up, but if your friend knows you are really trying to assist in this change, I think she will appreciate it. Be honest about how you feel, even if, as you say, you feel awkward or uncomfortable. Heaven knows *she* knows how big of a change this is, and as long as you are up front about your support, she'll be okay with it. You are, after all, a good friend.

I like the new floor plan, Lil.

Marv, you are doing wonderfully! Your friend will really value your support and any slip ups in gender or name appropiation will be unavoidable for awhile and only natural in the circumstances. Once you have become more accustomed to the change it will be easier, I'm sure. Just being out and about with your friend will help her in the transition stage to adapt her new image.

Happy Birthday, Mac!

Marv, one of the things that shocked me about me is how differently I react to men and to women. This is only really observable in situations like the one you are in, which are confusing.

I once had a business contact called Pat whom I only ever spoke to on the phone, and to this day I don't know if Pat was male of female. I found myself alternating between the mildly-flirty and the mildly-sporty-all-mates-together depending on which gender signals were coming across more strongly at the time.

What is even odder though is what happens when the visual signals are confused. One of the local pubs had a chef whose gender was indeterminate: either a butch woman or a not so butch bloke, or someone in transition, which looking back on it seems the most likely thing of all.

Looking at the chef was like looking at one of those optical illusions, such as one with the old lady / young girl image. If I looked at the chef as if he was a man then I found I focussed on one part of the face, and if I looked at the chef as if she was a woman I found I focussed on another part of the face. As I recollect the difference was between focussing on the eyes or on the area around the eyes and on the mouth. But since this is entirely subconscious normally, I cannot remember which way round it is.

So the long and the short of this Marv, is to be aware that some of our gender-responses are subliminal and subconscious, and that all sorts of odd things might unsettle you, possibly without you being aware that they *are* unsettling you, while your friend is changing.

But if I ever went through a life change as profound as the one your friend is going through, (and it is hard to think of any life change as profound as that), then I would pray to have just one friend like Marv around me. You are, as I have mentioned before, a good man, Marv, and one full of kindness and grace.

B

Happy Birthday, Mac

*goes to inspect the new conservatory*

Happy birthday Mac

Marv, sounds like you're doing the right thing with your friend, keep at it.

Happy birthday, Mac.

I have worked with someone who has changed gender, and someone else who merely changed her name. It was harder to deal with the name change, possibly because there was no physical reminder, so I kept messing that up and using her old name for months resulting in both of us getting frustrated.

Mac

Wow! Look at these changes. Things happen so quickly around here.

*puts a hand in her jacket pocket and finds two mbougatses* Matina, you are priceless.

[WM]

*Gah! No time, no time.*

Well, I set up an area between the atrium and the library that I thought would make a decent study or conference area; is that too busy? The alternative would be to use one of the workshop rooms. It should be nice, though, once you guys have selected the plantings for the atrium, and we thought Pierrot would probably enjoy it too. Your maximum height for trees is thirty feet.

*thinks* Of course, having Pierrot around might make it more noisy than somewhat. If you want to convert a workshop to carrels, just pick one and tell the bots what you want. We'll just put a big conference table in that open area.

That CLI Bot, Number 11, that Garius assigned to us to head the conversion -- he's very strong on proper feng shui. I got quite a lecture about the long hallways in the old floorplan! That's why we have a series of open spaces between the salon and the studios, instead of a narrow passage.

He'll be back today to help Marv and Hypatia organise their areas.

And how do you like where they've set up the fish tanks? *points to the west wall of the salon*

[spk]

Well Hello all

After a long absence (two weeks anyway)I am back on the internet

Please excuse me if I skip the backlog, and take it all from here.

I hope everybody is mananging

Toc.

Toc! How's things?

The Atelier is buzzing with activity and my head is spinning with all the to-ing and fro-ing.

*flops into her armchair, checking first that no s, s or are in the way first*

Thanks for the kind words and sage advice my friends. I informed the interested party about the conversation, perhaps we may gain a new salonista.

Caerwyn I'm Doing well.

Munchkins old flatmate went out of her way to make live difficult, but nothing of any importance, and all of our things are now up here in Glasgow, and mostly unpacked!

The flat is huge, much larger than I am used to, but we still manage to have too much stuff! The spare furniture will be off to the local charity shop, if none of the friends here have a requirement.

Job hunting is now underway, but I have to decide whether I fancy a standard desk job again, or something a bit different. A job in fabric shop is a possibility, but it isn't really a career move, but then I would enjoy it. Hmmm have to think.

Tocc - great to hear from you, glad everything is going well.

Courtesy

I think that just by taking the time to discuss your feelings and wanting to remain a true friend shows that you really care about this person, Marv, and I'm sure your friendship will remain as solid as ever.

Happy Birthday Mac!