It this thing on? Testing.....TESTING! This is a test of the Emerge.....

The conversation usually goes like this....

Me: "I've always known that I am female."

Them: "How?"

Me: "I just....knew."

Them: "How does that make sense? How do you KNOW what being female inside feels like?"

So we delve into the philosophical debate. How can I know that I feel like something when I can't experience another's feelings?

Usually this argument comes from someone who is Natal Female and usually it is said to prove how delusional I am.

So, the standard argument continues...

Me: "How do you know that you are female?"

Them: "I don't think about it. I don't think about myself as any gender. I am just...me."

Me: "How would you feel if you woke up tomorrow in the body of a man?"

Them: "I don't think it would be that big of a deal. I would just deal with it."

The argument usually goes around and around with nobody really changing their position.

What it comes down to is that no one can really compare their feelings to those of another. You can never really know how they feel.

So, here is another explanation. It has to do with how a Crystal Radio works.

Resonance.

Yep, here goes another one of Anne's wild tangents.

Bear with me.

Crystals, dependent on their size, will react at a certain frequency. Think about the wine glass trick. Take a crystal wine glass and moisten your finger. Hold the glass by its stem and gently rub your finger around the rim of the glass. If you use the right amount of pressure the glass will create sound, building up a pure tone. That is resonance, the innate tone of the crystal. This is also how shattering a glass with just your voice comes about (although volume has something to do with that as well).

The old crystal radio sets had crystals inside. Out there somewhere, someone was broadcasting a radio program on a specific frequency. When you apply power to the radio, if the resonance of the crystals that are being used in your radio come close to the frequency of the program being broadcast then voila, the program can be heard.

If the radio is nowhere near the same frequency as the program, you hear nothing.

So, here is the comparison.

When people are in harmony with their gender, their resonance is the same as the program. There is constant feedback that this is right, everything is fine. The thing is, if you heard the same thing all your life, you tend to ignore it. You can't hear it. It is that comforting background noise that is always there. It is innate - a given.

You have never heard its lack so you can't even conceive of it not being there. You have no need to describe it and people who try seem...well....crazy.

So then the Transsexual comes bopping along. We know about the signal, we know it is supposed to be there but we can't hear it. What we do know is what frequency we are supposed to tune into, what our radio resonates at.

We just want to move the radio to where there is a clear signal.

We want to resonate.