Major! Page #6

And then I ventured

into the backyard, and then

I went to the garage door,

stood by the door panting,

that I'd come to the garage

and someone might have seen me,

and then I ran back

into the house and stuff.

And it wasn't until I met

this older queen in Chicago,

her name was Kitty,

and she dressed me up

and showed me how to

put on make up and stuff.

And it was kind of like

the movie with Natalie Wood,

the Gypsy movie where

she gets

and she's so surprised

how pretty she was.

I'm a pretty girl Mama.

That's exactly

what happened to me, you know.

When Kitty was through with me

and I looked at myself

in the mirror, I was

absolutel

It was like "there's Major!

Where the hell have you been?"

Being transgender women,

and being transgender women

of color, and coming out

in the late '60s and early '70s,

there was a landscape

already out there, the landscape

itself was not healthy at all,

there was the street, there was

the clubs, there was the stage,

and there were pageants.

And then coming from home,

whether we were put out,

whether we left, whether

we were treated violently,

or however, this is

what we brought

to our new environment.

And many, many trans women

of color

I ended up leaving home at 18,

I was given $200, a car,

and told to never come back

unless I come home

and be a man in public

and be a girl inside the house.

Well, I can't do that,

I have to be me 24/7.

So I've been disowned,

cut off, and I've been alone,

I've done a lot of things,

nefarious things,

that I am not proud of.

But nor would I have changed

if I could go back in time

and change.

I would not change it

because it helped me grow

and become who I am today.

If my family loved me,

I wouldn't have

probably been a prostitute.

I wouldn't have probably been

a booster going

in stores stealing to survive.

I probably wouldn't mess

with this dope dealer

or this pimp, or something,

because they were the only one

that wasn't ashamed

to show me love in public.

So, I got to live me

though for now.

And this is who I am,

and this is who I'm going to be.

You don't get

a chance to choose.

That's true, it chooses you.

I tried to tell my mother that,

who was a therapist.

And also a gangsta.

Don't pick on us therapists!

And also a gangsta.

And she used to wake me up

in the middle of the night

with a gun to my head

and say y

Oh that was my father,

did they know each other?

And she would say you know

I could kill you right now,

you know they kill Black boys,

you know I could say

you were breaking in.

And I'd be like!

I was thrown out to the wolves.

And a lot of children

committed s

My father wanted me

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