I don’t remember when my friend Dana first mentioned to me the idea of she and I doing a podcast, though I do know what my response was, sure! I didn’t really know a whole lot about podcasts, as I don’t generally listen to many of them. I understood the basics, it is like a radio show, and I have listened to plenty of talk radio in the past. What I didn’t know, was, how exactly does one produce a podcast. No matter though, I so appreciate my friend Dana, and I’m always trying to find new ways to help educate the populace, thus the idea of one day, putting on a podcast appealed to me.
My friend Dana is an awesome human. I met her at my somewhat local LGBT+ resource center in Visalia, called The Source. Dana runs the transgender support group at The Source. She is a fabulous human who wanted to help bring some resources and support to the trans community of the Central Valley of California. It became very apparent to her about the lack of transgender assistance in our area when it was obvious that her oldest child is transgender. Life certainly changed when he transitioned at around fourteen or fifteen. Yeah, as I said, she is an awesome human being!
I certainly admire her, and thus I felt super honored when she asked me to do the podcast with her. The one thing we both knew would be an issue, is when exactly are we going to find the time in our crazy lives to add in one more thing to do. We were both super interested in doing this, but the reality of our lives is that they are truly super busy! Both of us have full time jobs and then we tend to pile other various bits and pieces on top of it. But I don’t really think that to my loyal blogging community members I need to explain just how busy my life is. You may notice from my super slow amount of blogging that I already have too much going on to possibly add anything else. And you may possibly be right.
Be that as it may, I am not going to let a little thing like not having enough time, dictate whether or not I am going to try and do a bit more for the transgender community. The older I am becoming, and the longer I go into AT (after transition, as opposed to BT) the more I am understanding that I am an educator. I’ve always understood that I have had a job as a teacher, but I have not always understood my relevance in the world as an educator. Recently I have been able to have several opportunities to try and help educate about the transgender community, and possibly reach cis-gender humans! That is faboo! I mean, I love having so many readers from the trans community, it is truly quite lovely! However, the trans community is super small, last estimate I heard was about 0.6% of the population. Being so tiny, if we want to have equal rights, we need to have allies! So, yeah, when I am presented with another opportunity to try and help educate about my favorite topic, then of course I will go for it!
Eventually Dana and I did find some time to record ourselves. Of course we had no idea of what we were really doing. We did have a computer, a microphone, recording software, lots to say, and some time with each other to just chat. And chat we did. We babbled on for about two hours! Thankfully, with some help from the fabulous Brian Poth, also from The Source, we were able to create a few episodes out of our blather. Dana recorded some bumpers, and picked out some music. I learned how to do editing and mixing. And hey, what do you know, the next thing is that she and I have our very own podcast!
Welcome to TransCisTer Radio! Do you like the word play within that? Brian and Dana came up with the name and graphic to go along with our show title. Personally, I love it!
So….. with all of that being said, I would truly appreciate you going and checking out our show. It is also available through: Stitcher, Google Play, Spotify, and iTunes! Wow, it feels so official! We currently have four episodes up. The first three are the first time Dana and I recorded ourselves. Surprisingly it works as three separate episodes. Episode four is the first one where we tried to follow a somewhat standard format, with actual timed segments! Wow!
Things are moving along with this podcasting thing, apparently. What type of schedule are Dana and I going to attempt to keep with this?? That’s funny. Schedule? Ha! She and I? Yeah, probably not going to happen. Unless we get famous, then maybe we could stick to a standard schedule! Haha.
As with most things that I find myself doing, I want you to know just how vast my insecurities are about doing it. I have about ten years of blogging behind me at this point, but when I first put up this blog, I was terrified! Now though, not so much, even with the increase of blog readers I have. With podcasting, what am I the most insecure about? Uhhh….. my voice. I feel the best I have ever felt about my voice. I currently am gendered properly over the phone, and even when I am not putting Herculean efforts into my appearance. So, how I feel about my voice, and the realities of my voice are two different things. Apparently the realities of my voice is that in hearing it, others take it to be feminine. But, when I hear it, it does not sound feminine enough. Which is where pretty much all of my insecurities lie, in that I am just not female enough, in my opinion. Which basically means, I am unjustly, a super hard-assed bitch to myself, as most women are. Ha-ha, her…. point being, is that even though I am super insecure about it, I am still trying to put myself out there.
Alrighty then!
Love you!
Love yourselves!
Love facing your insecurities!
Love educating!
Love you!
