August, 2011

When we think about change, we tend to see it as a choice we make for ourselves. We hear it all the time in the language of pop psychology: Self-improvement, personal growth, individual transformation, Deepak Chopra. But the truth is that whether we mean to or not, change is also something we foist on others. One person's change becomes everybody's change, the inevitable and often painful collision of kinesis and stasis, new revelations and old wisdom, complacency and expectancy. This was one of the many things (well, three things) that I learned when Tom's transformation knocked me off-axis. Change is not just a quiet private personal journey. Change, my friends, is a contact sport.

In my case this was demonstrated quite literally, in the form of my new Ninja avocation. Although Sensei Gilbert hated when people used the word sport in reference to what he taught. Mixed Martial Arts is a sport, he would insist. We are a battle art. Either way, there was definitely plenty of contact, and I had the bruises to prove it.

(And for any MMA practitioners who are offended by what they've read and want to prove how tough their "sport" is by kicking my ass, let me say two things. First, I'm a fifty-something middle-aged overweight arthritic Jew. Of course you can kick my ass. It would be sad if you couldn't. Second, since when do MMA practitioners know how to read?)

Anyway, it is strange to think that were it not for Tom's transition, I probably never would have walked into Sensei Gilbert's dojo. Which, at least early on, would have been more than fine with him. I was a fan of Sensei Gilbert, but he could barely tolerate me. He thought I was obstinate, contrary and reckless. He was a perceptive guy, but I believed he misread my intentions, mistaking incompetence for intransigence.

Although I did accidentally break Darian's foot, dropping knee first onto his instep approximately three seconds after Sensei pointedly told me not to drop knee first for this exact reason. So maybe he did have a point.

(Darian, it must be noted, embraced his broken foot as an opportunity to further his training. Who knows? he said, The day might come when I have to face an opponent one-footed. Thanks to you, I'll be ready! Darien was hard core.)

Overall though — Sensei's annoyance and Darian's crushed metatarsals notwithstanding — Sherman Oaks Martial Arts was doing for me what I hoped it would. Restoring some sense of balance to my life. Taking the edge off of my stress. Both of those things would be especially important on this particular day. Because after class I would go home, shower, get changed and, finally, meet Tamara for the first time.

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She drove past our kitchen window and then turned into the carport. Cookie, as usual, was flipping out.

I took a loud, theatrical breath."Here we go," I said to Samantha.

"You can do this,"she said, making light of my apprehension, but not unkindly. "Be strong."

I smiled and raised a power fist, then walked outside to greet Tamara, closing the door behind me to keep Cookie from running out onto the driveway.

"Good morning!" I said, affecting a casual air.

"How's it going?" she said, doing the same.

Tamara was wearing a a floral print wrap dress. Shades of purple, splashes of white, a smattering of mint. She had oversized movie star sunglasses that were pushed up on her forehead and dangly gold earrings that matched her jingly gold bracelets. Her pedicured toes sparkled through open-toed sandals. (Her fingernails, however, were still unpainted and would remain that way until she finally came out publicly.) Her makeup struck me as overdone. Inexpertly applied lipstick, heavy-handed eye shadow and too much blush, reminiscent of my teenage daughters' early works.

To be perfectly candid, Tamara did not look like a woman to me. To me, Tamara still looked like Tom, but in women's clothing. A costume. But this was less a commentary on Tamara than it was on me, because despite all the the changes, I could not help but see my friend as I used to see him. My friend as I understood him. And I didn't just see Tom, I heard him too, his voice, still in the same masculine register it had always been, creating a tremendous gender gap between apparel and intonation.

There were a few excruciating moments while we both stood there uncomfortably — the only sound my impatient dog scratching at the door — waiting for my reaction. My mind was a blank. All I knew was that the longer it took me to say something, the worse that something would sound.

"Well," I finally managed, gesturing vaguely at Tamara's ensemble, "there we are." As to what that was supposed to mean, your guess is as good as mine.

Tamara didn't know how to respond to that, and looked at me expectantly, perhaps thinking I had more to say on the subject. I didn't. I had seen her, I had acknowledged her. As far as I was concerned, my work here was done.

In hindsight, I understand how wildly divergent our agendas had been. She wanted the moment to be a celebration — the butterfly emerging from her chrysalis — while I just wanted the moment to be over.

I turned and walked into the house with Tamara following. In the kitchen, Samantha was holding Cookie by the collar. Tamara bent over and held out a hand for her to sniff (Cookie, not Samantha) but she barked instead.

"I guess she doesn't like me now that I'm a girl."

"To be fair, she didn't like you when you were a boy, either." Truthfully, apart from the four people living in our house, Cookie did not like anybody. She was quirky like that. That's what can happen, I guess, when you play Rescue Dog Roulette.

"I'll be right back," I said, indicating the bathroom down the hall. "Talk amongst yourselves." I realized that it would likely seem to Tamara like I was trying to get away from her, but I wasn't; rather, the combination of too much coffee and my neutrino-sized bladder had created an increasingly urgent biological imperative. Not everything I did was in reaction to Tamara. Sometimes, I just needed to pee.

When I returned to the kitchen, Samantha and Tamara were chatting and Cookie, calm now, was laying on the wood floor. Her bushy tail thumped loudly on the floor in greeting.

I scratched her behind the ears. "Hello, pretty!"

"Hi!" Tamara replied in a chipper voice.

I turned to her and waggled an index finger at her. "Uh-uh," I said. "We're not doing that yet."

And then we went to work.

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My home office was minuscule, just big enough for a desk, a small book case and two office chairs, side by side. It also had minimal ventilation. And because of that when I closed the door I discovered something that I had not previously noticed out in the open air: Tamara was wearing perfume. It was sweet and powdery and I could feel it tickling my nostrils. Soon, I felt pressure building in my sinuses. I breathed through my mouth believing, for some reason, that it might help.

It was becoming painful, but I didn't want to embarrass Tamara. After all, this was the very first time I saw her as she truly wanted to be seen, and my body was rejecting her like a mismatched kidney. I figured I'd tough it out — hell, if Darien could deal with a smashed foot I could surely deal with Chanel No. 5, or whatever the hell this was — and for a while I did, coughing discreetly into my hand. But then I started breaking out in hives.

"Um, so..." I began, trying to figure out a way to do this tactfully, "In the category of things I never thought I'd say..."

She looked up from her iPad. "Yeah?"

"I think I'm allergic to your perfume."

As feared, she was embarrassed. "I didn't use that much," she said defensively. "And it's supposed to be hypoallergenic."

"I'm sure that's true, but..." I pulled on the collar of my T-shirt to expose the Orion's Belt of red bumps on my neck. I didn't want her to feel bad, but I also didn't want her to think that I was feigning symptoms to get her to leave.

"Oh, shit. Sorry."

"It's OK," I said. "You didn't know."

"Maybe we should pick this up again tomorrow," she suggested, gathering up her things, stuffing them into her burgundy leather purse.

"Cool," I said. "See you tomorrow.

Cookie barked ferociously at her as she headed for her car.

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After Tom left, and I had swirled cortisone cream on my itchy welts, Samantha filled me in on her conversation with Tamara, while she pruned the pittosporum in the back yard with garden shears. Snip snip snip.

"First, I told him that..." Samantha closed her eyes, shook her head and started again. "I told her that she looked very nice." Snip snip snip.

I eyed her skeptically. "Did you really think that?"

She shrugged. "What else was I supposed to say?" Snip. "I did like her sandals, though." Snip snip. "They're very stylish."

"I'll take your word for it."

"Then he—" Samantha growled in frustration. "She," she reminded herself. "She. She. She."

"Welcome to my hell."

"She told me that she was disappointed by your reaction." Snip snip.

I was taken aback. "What was wrong with my reaction?"

"You didn't compliment her on her outfit." Snip snip snip.

I rolled my eyes at the sky. "Oh, for fuck's sake. Really?"

Samantha stopped gardening and looked at me. "She spent a lot of time figuring out what to wear. She wanted to look nice for you. It's kind of sweet, if you think about it." Then she turned away again, focused on the shrubs. Snip snip.

This was a whole new level of weird. Tom — damn it! — Tamara wanted to look nice for me? The whole idea creeped me out. I'm not saying it should have; I'm just saying it did. It was, I think, the subconscious fear that now that my friend was a woman, she would be attracted to me (or maybe always was). It was a fear that made no sense. Not just because she probably wasn't attracted to me, but because even if she was — and who could blame her? I've got legs for days — so what? What difference would it make? None.

But there was, of course, a simpler explanation for wanting to look nice for me. I was essentially meeting her for the first time, she was feeling insecure and she was hoping I would validate her. Which was perfectly reasonable. Up to a point. That point being that she had known me a very long time. Long enough to know that validation was not my forte. On any topic, really, but especially clothing.

"This is bullshit," I said to Samantha, feeling indignant. "I'm supposed to compliment his clothes now? Hell, I hardly ever compliment your clothes, and you're my wife!" It was true. It happened so rarely that when I did compliment something Samantha was wearing, she'd be either startled or suspicious, depending on the context. "And I don't hear you complaining!"

"Yes, well, that's pretty much what I said to Tom." She realized her mistake and added an "Ara."

"Thank you!" I said, grateful for the support. "And if you don't have a problem with it, why should she?"

Samantha fixed me with a stony stare.

"What?" I asked warily.

"What makes you think," she replied icily, gesturing with the shears, "I don't have a problem with it?"

I couldn't believe the direction this conversation had taken. "You just said you didn't."

"I said I didn't complain." There was a sharpness to her tone that I had not heard before. "There's a difference."

She turned away again. Snip snip snip. I stood there — angrily, worriedly, stupidly — deciding whether I should pursue this conversation further, but I decided instead to let it drop. Hopefully, this was just an aberration, a one-time flare-up, and everything would go back to normal.

But it wasn't to be. Because change is a contact sport. And while I didn't quite realize it yet, I had just taken a brutal hit.