After Ashley’s wobbly visit with her parents over Independence Day weekend in which her parents carelessly outed Ashley to her brother’s parents-in-law, Ashley came to realize that her parents weren’t using her pronouns when she wasn’t around. So she decided to write a third letter to her parents.
(If you might like to catch up on Ashley’s earlier letters, check out “Immovable Object” from July 2013 and “The Letter” from June 2012.)
Ashley sent her letter in early November with the hope that maaaybe her parents might give some thought to practicing her name and pronouns before she came to visit for Thanksgiving — especially since a bunch of Ashley’s sister-in-law’s family were coming to visit for Thanksgiving, and Ashley dreaded the thought of her parents nonchalantly outing her to them one by one as her parents chatted to them throughout the day.
Oddly enough, Ashley’s parents didn’t seem all that interested in talking through her letter before she arrived, so she didn’t quite know what to expect going into her visit. But to her pleasant surprise, Ashley’s parents seemed to make an earnest effort with her name and pronouns — maybe they actually did a little practicing after all? However her parents made their progress, Ashley just hopes that their efforts aren’t another flash in the pan.
Ashley also chats with Jay about a few makeup finds. MAC’s Select Moisturecover Concealer has been holding its own as Ashley’s long-time concealer, but she also recently came across Kat Von D’s Lock-It Concealer. She discovered that each concealer has its own uses, so Ashley ends up hanging on to both of them.
After reading The Sweet Home’s mascara comparison, Ashley decided to give Buxom’s Lash Waterproof Mascara a shot. Ashley was a little worried about the “waterproof” part — because sometimes waterproof mascaras can be a bit of a bear to remove. But Ashley’s impressed with the extent that Buxom’s mascara manages to avoid flaking without being impervious to makeup remover at the end of the day.
(Ashley’s polish in this episode is Tartan Punk from CND’s gel line. We aren’t being paid to say this — just thought maybe you’d like to know.)
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I’m visiting my folks in Charlotte for a few days, and things started out pretty well with my dad. He picked me up at the airport, said, “Hi, Ashley” when he greeted me, and we were off to the races.
Once we got home, I chatted with my mom a bit too, and while I don’t mind “Snooks” as an occasional nickname, my mom just kept calling me Snooks and never once my name. Finally, after about the third time:
MOM: And Snooks, Dinner will probably be ready around 6:00.
ME: “I’d prefer if you’d call me Ashley.”
[Before my mom could reply, my dad chimed in:]
DAD: “Well, we said that we’d try to call you Ashley in public. But we still like Snooks, and we’ll go with that sometimes too.”
I was too stunned to say anything. And it really chapped my hide not only that they weren’t really over this hump but also that they seemed to think I was the insensitive one for bringing it up. For fuck’s sake.
I haven’t talked with either of my parents since July 18 when I ended a call after my dad wouldn’t call me by my name. Up until then, I’d usually talk to one parent or the other every three or four days, so it’s been a bit of an adjustment to go over two months without talking to either of them.
It so happens that today is my dad’s birthday, and although he and I still have our differences, I figured that I’d give him a call—I wasn’t sure if it might be awkward, but he’s still my old man, for Pete’s sake. I sort of thought of it like how some opposing soldiers would put down their arms on Christmas day and share a meal together.
I just got off the phone with him, and the call was somewhat surreal—our chat had many of the same conversational cues as if everything were fine, but I think we both knew that wasn’t really the case.
As the call was wrapping up, my dad asked if I had any travel plans coming up. Since I’m not working—and unlikely to spend money on travel for the heck of it—I think that was my dad’s way of asking whether I’d be coming to visit for Thanksgiving. At first I was reluctant to answer, seeing as though I didn’t want to rain on my dad’s birthday call, but I finally said,
ME: “I don’t have any travel coming up in the next few weeks… but I suppose Thanksgiving is coming up in November too. And I think I’d like to come for Thanksgiving. If you were to call me Ashley, I’d love to stay with you at the house. Or if not, I may book a room at a nearby hotel or stay with someone else.”
DAD: “Okay.
[beat]
“So how are things going with the job hunt?”
Sometimes I wish my dad would set aside his stiff-upper-lip routine and tell me how he feels. Granted, a birthday call probably wouldn’t be the right context to get into a full discussion, but even a sentence or two of his thoughts would have been nice to hear.
My dad called me just now, and I had a hunch he might try to carry on a conversation while avoiding all names and nicknames for me entirely.
(The last time that my dad called me “Snooks” over the phone, I ended the call. So I wasn’t surprised that he might try to find another “loophole” to try to call me without actually having to use my name.)
Sure enough, he plowed ahead with his plan:
ME: “Hi, this is Ashley.”
DAD: “Hi. How are you?”
ME: “Hi Dad. I can see what you’re doing there. And that’s not okay either. I’d like you to call me by my name.”
DAD: “We’ve discussed this.
[beat]
“So how has your week been going?”
ME: “Dad, we can talk more about this when you’re ready to call me by my name. Goodbye.”
This time around, I didn’t offer a one-one-thousand grace period before I said goodbye—I was so sick of the “We’ve discussed this” bullshit that I just wanted to get off the phone as soon as possible.
Oh, and for anyone curious, the call lasted 31 seconds.
My parents called—they were both on the line— and they sang “Happy Birthday” to me over the phone. But they seemed to take some creative license with the lyrics.
The tradition version of the song is, of course:
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday, dear [name],
Happy birthday to you.
But their rendition went a bit differently:
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to youuuu,
Happy birthday to you.
I just—I don’t even. What.
And then my parents and I had some light chitchat—and throughout the call they managed to avoid calling me by any name, nickname or otherwise. I don’t even know what to say.
I just got off the phone with my dad.
ME: “Hi, this is Ashley.”
DAD: “Hi, Snooks. How are you?”
ME: “Hi, Dad. I’d like you to call me by my name.”
DAD: “We’ve discussed this. We’ve agreed not to call you [birthname] and to call you Snooks instead.”
[pause]
“And we don’t like the name Ashley. So we’ll be calling you Snooks.”
ME: “Well, we can continue our conversation when you’re ready to call me by my name.”
[I counted a one one-thousand in my head—just in case my dad had second thoughts.]
“Goodbye, Dad.”
And then I put down the phone.
Even though Ashley’s name change has gone through, she’s wasn’t sure whether it would make any difference when she visited her parents over Thanksgiving. It turns out, Ashley’s cousins, aunts, and uncles seem to have become all the more supportive, while her parents still lag behind.
Ashley goes over a conversation with her parents in which she tried to gently ask them again if they could please use her pronouns. She was expecting that it might be a five-minute conversation — mostly just putting out the request and then awaiting the invariable milquetoast response — but Ashley recalls that the conversation nosedived right from the start. Although Ashley had hoped to focus on her pronouns rather than her name (which seemed to be more of a sticking point), her parents soon derailed the discussion to harp on about her name.
Although Ashley’s parents have moved on to using a childhood nickname for her — well, most of the time — Ashley laments that this would-be interim name seems to have taken up permanent residence. Ashley and Jay ponder how she could try to convey to her parents how important it is to her that they use her name. They mull over a few ideas and Jay half-jokingly tosses out the idea that Ashley could have photocopies of her driver’s license at the ready to pass out to any doubting bystanders.
Ashley recalls her dad telling an anecdote about her college years and, after Ashley discovered that he was using the wrong pronouns, she chimed in with a brief correction, only to have her dad offer the rationalization, “but you were a ‘he’ at the time.” Realizing that the I Would Prefer These Pronouns When Referring to My Past discussion wasn’t something she could squeeze in as an aside over dinner with guests, Ashley contemplates whether she should send her parents an email to talk through some of that.
Back in our second episode, Ashley sung the praises of using primer as part of one’s makeup routine, including recommendations for L’Oreal Paris’ Magic Perfecting Base and Smashbox’ Photo Finish. After recently noticing a reformulation of L’Oreal’s primer, however, Ashley revisits whether it’s still a comparable product against Smashbox’ Photo Finish. Ashley also follows up on some earlier thoughts about cleaning one’s makeup brushes and she shares some tips to help prevent one’s brushes from losing their bristles.
(Ashley’s polish in this episode is German-icure from OPI. We aren’t being paid to say this — just thought maybe you’d like to know.)
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Ashley answers 7 Questions for the we happy trans project, such as who’s been most supportive of her transition, changes she’d like to see in the world, and how she’s helping to make those changes.
Jay asks how Ashley’s new coworkers are accepting of her gender identity, given that some knew her since before her transition while others have only ever known her as Ashley.
Ashley receives a postcard from her vacationing parents, but they addressed it to her birth name and Ashley can’t bring herself to read it. She wants to talk with them again about calling her Ashley, but worries that her parents could become fatigued on the subject if she were to bring it up too frequently. She and Jay also discuss the unusual evidence her mother cites to try to refute Ashley’s gender identity.
Jay learns that Too Faced Shadow Insurance (an eyeshadow primer) benefits from a little shakey-shake before use, as one would do with a squeeze bottle of ketchup (or with natural peanut butter if you’re fancy). Ashley also discerns that her technique for repainting some nails (but not others) with a zip-top bag requires a new baggie about every six months.
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Ashley teaches Jay about the nuances and changing meanings of some of the more hurtful slurs directed toward trans folks, with help from GLAAD’s transgender glossary of terms.
Jay asks Ashley to elaborate on what she means when she says she’s “always been a woman” and if that means she regrets not having come out at an earlier point in her life.
Together, they discuss whether it would be feasible to raise a baby as gender neutral until they were old enough to express their gender identity.
They also discuss the nail-protecting power of gloves and Ashley sings a jingle about them. (Caveat: The “gloves song”—all three seconds of it—is only available in the video version of this episode.)
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