Happiness is Being Yourself Not Someone Else
What is happiness? Happiness is being yourself and being with someone who loves you as you. I know who I am. Do you know who you are? I mean, who you really are? Are you being yourself?
What makes you you? Do you believe you are whoever you want to be? That you make yourself? Is the person you are today the same person you will be tomorrow?
Nothing is how it seems. Life would be dull if it was.
My parents were hippie types. Dad had the Jesus look with long hair, a beard, soft brown eyes. Mum was slender with small breasts, blue eyes, long legs and a yin & yang tattoo on her shoulder. She plaited her corn-coloured hair with red beads and played the guitar. I took after my mum, a skinny boy with a narrow waist, the same blue eyes like chips of sky. My hair had never been cut and I wore it like mum. I had been named Robert, but she always called me Bertie.
We had a small, jumpy, brown pug named Git. I loved Git. We were the same age. We played together, slept together, and I’m sure he must have thought he was a little boy, just as I sometimes thought I was a little dog.
Dad had a green camper van. When I was three, we stayed in Greatstone, a seaside resort. I lived on the beach. My parents believed in being yourself letting go and all things natural. We were vegetarians. Mum went topless. Dad wore a sarong. I never wore anything and tanned all over the same colour as Git. I played in the sea and peed in the sea. I learned how to throw sticks and Git would plunge into the surf and race back with the stick in his strong jaws panting and looking up at me.
Being Yourself and Being Happy
One windy day, the tide was stronger. I had become good at throwing sticks and that last stick I threw was carried away in the swirls of water. Git swam far out, looking for the stick, and I called ‘Git, Git, come back,’ and watched as he turned to paddle back to shore.
Git was barking as I ran out through the waves towards him. He jumped up and I felt his teeth close around me. I screamed so loud I pierced a hole in the universe. Git wrenched his jaw as he bit down harder, the pain was like no pain that can be imagined, the pain of childbirth, and I woke in hospital with mum at the bedside.
I had spent twelve hours in surgery. The doctors neatly tucked what was left of my penis into a vagina and I never missed what I don’t recall ever having. Sitting down to pee came naturally. I was used to running around naked. When mum bought me dresses, they slipped over my thin shoulders like it was meant to be and it was meant to be. I was being myself.
I was registered at school as Roberta. I played with dolls and hated boys. I had been taking hormones since I was three, to make sure my girlie bits functioned as girlie bits should, and when small breasts appeared I looked just like my mum. I did feel jealous of the other girls when they started having periods, but enjoyed the advantages of not having them.
When people ask me how old I am I say 22. For 22 years I have been me and that little boy I was is gone forever like the lost stick. I changed my name, severing that part of the past, and was reborn as Amanda Quinn – AQ, any questions?
I have a flat in Greatstone where I paint water colours of the sea and go for long walks among the sand dunes with my brown pug named Bertie. Look out for me. I am the beautiful woman with long legs and a yin & yang tattoo on her shoulder. When men ask for me for my telephone number, I tell them my story. They rarely call. They are attracted to the me they imagine I am, not the me I am.
What is happiness? Happiness is being yourself and being with someone who loves you as you. What is Love? Here are my thoughts.
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