Step, Ball & Career Change

by norrie mAy-welby

(The Gender Centre advise that this article may not be current and as such certain content, including but not limited to persons, contact details and dates may not apply. Where legal authority or medical related matters are cited, responsibility lies with the reader to obtain the most current relevant legal authority and/or medical publication.)

I'd been doing sex work for the last four years, having come to it late in life, and I had a lot of fun and value from it, but it was getting old, it was getting old. Not me, I mean, love, one thing I'll say for castration is it takes years off your age. Maybe I can do ads for it on telly, between the Oil of Ulan and the Grecian 2000.

Anyway, as I was saying, it was just getting harder and harder to drag myself out to the street, and I could stand it less and less. If it was all clients it'd be alright, but it's not, and it got so the diminishing money wasn't worth the time wasters, the general abuse, and the mindless mind-numbing boredom.

Then I saw this thing in the Star Observer about this course for tranys, promising to help tranys work out what they want to do and what they'd be good at employment wise. I'd felt stymied as far as employment went; there was nothing I could think of I could do that I'd want to. I certainly knew I didn't want to go back to my old jobs, bar work or the public service, and certainly not the hypocritical hierarchical bullshit of my last "straight" job.

As I read the accompanying article the fabulous picture of Ilea ("Her! I know her!"), I got the impression the course would help me see what skills I had and reveal a compatible career I would enjoy. Frankly, I suspected I was rather talented, but had no idea how to translate this into employment. This course could be just what I need, I thought, and I rung up the Gender Centre that Monday to enquire about it.

"The registration day is today," they told me, and gave me the number and address of Alternative Networks in Surry Hills.

"Can you come in at 2 o'clock?" Ilea asked. Why not? And so, within a few hours of reading about it, I was formally enrolled in the Alternative Employment Career Seekers (A.C.E.S.) course.

Once I realised I was over sex work, I could barely drag myself out for long enough to say goodbye to it. I'm not promising not to be back, but I promised myself long ago that I'd never make myself do it if I didn't feel like it, and I no longer feel like it.

It's been a bit dicky jumping straight off sex work and onto the dole, but a friend lent me money, and I discovered a technicality that meant I was six weeks ahead with my rent. (The landlord failed to give me proper written notice of a rent increase a year ago, which meant I'd legally overpaid him all this time.) I also got a commission to do a little graphic work for The Gender Centre, received news that an article I'd submitted to a major magazine was sold, and discovered a couple of other unanticipated income prospects. My grateful thanks to the Goddesses and Gods and Non-Gender-Specific Deities of prosperity!

The course? The course has been a buzz. Well more like a dull roar most of the time. Apparently us tranys are a bit more dynamic than the average queer. I think it's because when we open up and let go of the limits of gender and let go of all that Goddamn victim shit ... We access twice as much energy and talent as the average gender-bound possum, and the resulting productivity is squared.

I've discovered career options that I've never even heard of, and was guided to produce a suitable resume and portfolio for this. I've also learnt of opportunities for further training and employment in my newly chosen vocation, and the consultants at Alternative Networks will help me pursue these.

Compared to the other things I've gained from the course, though, the career stuff seems almost incidental. It's been an absolute joy to work with my own kind, with others who understand what it is to live in a world that says they should be just this or just that and never change, but know that who they are demands they live beyond those limits.

Past experiences have made me very wary of my fellow tranys. I don't need to be subject to judgmental attitudes, one-upmanship, denial, homophobia, plain bitchiness and "living out abuse". Thankfully, the course attracted none this. We were all there because our lives weren't perfect, and we were prepared to admit that and do something about it. We contracted to help each other, be honest and open-minded, and not put anyone else down.

Love, we blossomed. We laughed with each other. We argued passionately. We asserted our boundaries. We found our limits and values respected, much as we were encouraged to stretch and circumnavigate our own limits. We created monstrous campness and plotted the End of Western Civilisation As We Know It. We let our dreams and fancies unfurl in full flight, and established practical methods to ensure worldly success.

If all you're prepared to change about yourself is your gender, don't bother with this course. Stay as you are. Tell yourself it's not your fault you can't get a decent job, because you're a trany, or not skilled enough, or too spring, or too pretty and everybody's just jealous of you, or too independently minded, or too old or too fat or too young or too thin, or whatever reason you have for not having fulfilling employment.

If, on the other hand, you're prepared to change your success rate in employment and the amount of happiness your employment gives you, if you're prepared to expand your idea of what's possible for you, then maybe you should call Alternative Networks. Call 9212 7757. Call Now. Our operators are standing by. Send no money, we'll bill the Department Of Employment Education and Training, and bless them for paying for this (Oh, and they even gave me a little bit extra on top of the dole for lunch money.)

Don't forget that if you want to do a course like this in the future, you have to be receiving a benefit to be eligible.

Oh, and we made a video in our course you might like to see. I expect the Gender Centre will have a copy of this.

I'll leave you with a quote from someone destined to be rich and famous: (okay, so it's my blurb from the video. And I'm already a weeny bit famous. Rich is next. Anyway, here goes.) All a genius is, is a human being operating with their full potential.

Blessed Be

All who would be all that they are.

p.s. Humungously fabulous thank you's to the wonderful people who made it all happen, including all the tremendously terrific tranys who undertook it with me, the tremagnifique marvelous tranys who took time to come and talk to us, Jill, Tania and Natasha, the stupendous staff from Alternative Networks, Ilea, Marie, Fraser and Michael, the generous Gender Centre people, especially Sophia, and all the bodacious bureaucrats who made it possible fiscal-wise, particularly the Junoesque Joan Kirner.

Polare is published in Australia by The Gender Centre Inc. which is funded by the Department of Community Services under the S.A.A.P. Program and supported by the N.S.W. Health Department through the AIDS and Infectious Diseases Branch. Polare provides a forum for discussion and debate on gender issues. Advertisers are advised that all advertising is their responsibility under the Trade Practices Act. Unsolicited contributions are welcome, though no guarantee is made by the Editor that they will be published, nor any discussion entered into. The editor reserves the right to edit such contributions without notification. Any submission which appears in Polare may be published on our internet site. Opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the Editor, The Gender Centre Inc.I, the Department of Community Services or the N.S.W. Department of Health.