Transcriber: Jai Simon Reviewer: Amanda Zhu
Do you remember being a child alone in your room at night,
the lightning crashing,
the thunder rumbling,
skeletal hands slowly reaching across the walls,
a sliver of an open closet door
just hiding and inviting all the terrors inside?
And you are under your covers with such an intense and paralyzing fear
that the idea of putting your feet to the floor
is an impossible task.
Now, take that fear
and put it into the body of a full-grown, college educated adult
who is simply asked to go to the grocery store.
Now, luckily, the kid
has family and people who can come into the room
and rip open the closet door,
show that everything’s okay,
explain away the shadows and the rumbles.
So now that child can go forward with the knowledge and the allies
to be more brave for the next time.
Now, how does an adult, someone like me,
take that fear,
and without all that support and all those resources,
overcome that fear?
My name is Savannah,
and under all this is Chuck.
I am an advocate,
an author,
a podcaster,
and a cross-dresser.
When I tell people I’m a cross-dresser,
I usually get at least one of the following questions:
“Oh, so you’re like a drag queen!”
No, I am not that fabulous, and I am not that good an entertainer.
“Oh, so you want to be a lady with lady parts?”
No, I'm very happy to be in my male body.
I just have a need to express myself in a feminine way once in a while.
“Oh, but you’re gay, right?”
No, I've always loved women,
and there is actually no proof
that a non-transitioning cross-dressing person
has any more likelihood of being gay than any other demographic.
So how did I get here?
Well, I’m the middle child of three in a family of five,
grew up in a conservative Midwest in the 70s and 80s.
We ate dinner around the same table at the same time most nights.
The problem is that same table is where my mom and dad spoke openly
and gossiped about the likelihood of the neighbor boy being gay.
Why?
Because he was open enough about wearing high-heeled shoes
when we played pretend on his front porch.
That being said,
hearing my mom and dad condemn this boy with what they were saying about him,
it made me realize
that maybe I should keep my love for my mom’s high heels to myself.
Growing up in my preadolescence, I had no role models that were like me.
Actually, I take that back.
I had one role model who used to come into the house
every Saturday morning.
In my adolescence and in my teen years,
I finally understood the word “tranny”
and what it meant.
The problem was at the time,
it had already taken on such a hateful slur
that I was hesitant to ever take that on as who I was.
But after college, with a marriage and a move to New York City,
a whole world of diversity opened up to me.
I saw my first drag queen in real life.
In fact, I saw a bevy of drag queens in real life all at the same time,
all working and performing at a restaurant in lower Manhattan
called Lucky Cheng’s.
They were happy,
the patrons adored them, there seemed to be a sense of community,
and they unknowingly led me to the point
where I could accept the word “transvestite” for myself.
And with that, my world opened up.
And with that, of course, you know, if you take that next step,
you need to have a name.
And I was told at the time
that you should have the name of your first pet
and the street you grew up on.
Well, I was not answering to Shaggy,
so that was out.
But instead, my name just happened to find me,
and a fully-fledged Savannah was born.
Now, these are the Savannah, early years,
but really is more like Savannah, the hot mess years.
But I was happy.
I was dressing femininely.
I was enjoying life, going out to the clubs,
and being with friends.
The problem is that with every moment of self-acceptance
are just more profound and personal questions to ask yourself.
And as a result, gender identity,
gender expression
were words I had never heard of.
They weren't popularized in the 90s yet.
I was questioning my sexuality at a moment
where I had never questioned my sexuality up to that exact moment.
You have to remember in the 90s,
the Internet was still a baby and I was just a novice.
Unfortunately, soon thereafter, my wife and I divorced,
but it's because we were on different journeys.
She was on a discovery path for her own sexuality,
and I wanted to understand more of what and who I was as Savannah.
Each relationship I had, Savannah was included, for good or bad.
In my longest relationship,
Savannah started off as a novelty
and as something fun to do behind closed doors.
But because of the fact that she was concerned
about what people might think of her, about me
and what people might think of me,
and trying to protect me.
And because I hate conflict,
I focused on her own happiness and her own comfort over my own,
and I put Savannah deep into the closet.
It took 10 years for Savannah to raise her voice loud enough
to finally hear her say that she was worthwhile,
she was entitled to breathe and that she should have happiness.
So I finally stuck up for myself and stood up for myself
and looked for a community in the area that would accept me.
And with that, I found a community of people like myself.
I heard their stories, and together and by myself,
I was able to thrive.
Unfortunately, at home,
because of the secrecy
and because of the resentment that had built up
and because we didn't have the resources to integrate Savannah in a healthy way,
that 15-year relationship ended.
Moving forward to 2018,
my current girlfriend, Judy, and I
had to leave New York.
And I was terrified of leaving that community behind
because I was terrified even more
that I wouldn’t be able to find that community where we were moving to.
Because folks, I moved to South Carolina.
That is a God-fearing, gun-toting,
red leaning state.
Where would I possibly find a cross-dressing community
that I could find myself in again?
Well,
prior to the move and after the move,
it took a despondent and desperate and demoralizing six months for me,
with my girlfriend’s help
and thinking outside the cross-dressing box,
to find anything that Savannah could be a part of.
It was a Meetup app group for the LGBTQ community.
They welcomed me in,
even though I was one of the only cross-dressers.
From there, I got an invitation
to join the monthly meetings for the local P-flag group.
And from there,
I took in my first pride event in Spartanburg.
That allowed me, with the help of these communities and these leaders,
to finally say to myself and have enough confidence
to realize and make a promise to myself that I needed to be visible
in a way that was beyond just social media
and be in the public eye.
So, with that visibility,
I discovered gracious and welcoming and curious South Carolinians
who took me into their hearts and called me “friend”.
And with that visibility, I started to frequent, every weekend,
a certain chain of coffee shops
just to prove that I am just as amazing and normal as everyone else.
So how was it
that with all that,
that paralyzing fear returned when I was sitting in my car
because I was asked to go run an errand to the grocery store?
Because I know how so many people think of it -
deviant, mentally ill, fetishistic.
predatory, an abomination to God -
all because I choose to dress in a manner beyond my biology.
On a personal level, I’ve heard friends and colleagues
talk down in derogatory to queers, about queers,
not realizing that I am one.
They just know me in male mode.
I've been told about a mother's lament about the protection of her child
because I shook that child’s hand in church.
Even my social media, I expect hate mail.
On a grander scale,
I’ve seen the viral videos where people in my community are beaten.
I’ve listened to the news reports that claimed that I am a pervert
just trying to get into the ladies’ room for nefarious things.
Transgender women are targeted and murdered every year
in an ongoing epidemic.
And most sadly and most unfortunately,
our LGBTQ youth
has a suicide attempt rate
three times that of their cisgender and straight counterparts.
So as I’m sitting in the car with my hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel,
those thoughts and many more are racing through my head.
You have to remember
that for me, my confidence was built and bred in a vacuum,
without support systems, without resources,
when I was in my most formative years.
So like a flame under a glass dome, it's very easily extinguished.
Because indoctrinated fear over years is not easily rooted out.
It didn’t matter that I’d found my community,
it didn't matter that I've been continuing my research
and becoming more confident in public.
I had gone from the safety and inclusivity of the coffee shop I loved
three hundred yards across the street to a parking lot of a grocery store
where I felt vulnerable, alone, and exposed.
Now, did I survive?
Of course, I did.
After several minutes, I went in,
came back to the car unscathed
with no more than just a few stares
and a very strange quick conversation in the checkout line.
But that was barely two years ago,
barely.
It’s 2021.
What are we doing to effect change?
What are we doing to mitigate the risks and get rid of the fear?
Advocacy,
education,
and empowerment.
The cross-dressing community is woefully underrepresented.
Why?
Because non-transitioning cross-dressing folks
do not need to present themselves in their duality 24/7.
And as a result,
we have the ability to hide ourselves away.
But if we continue to hide, nothing ever changes.
So for those who can come forward and be visible,
they need to come forward.
And for those who want to help us and be allies,
we only ask that you share with us
that you are a safe haven and a protected platform
from which we can be seen just living our lives.
And once we capture people’s attention,
we need to be courageous enough to tell our stories
and answer any questions.
Because for too many years,
we have been put into a stigmatized and mislabeled box
because people just don’t know or have not been taught any different.
So the longer we stay silent,
the longer people will cling to these ideals
that are antiquated and outdated.
For me, to be visible on this stage and to be vocal with you is a risk.
Anybody who hears or sees this can connect Savannah to Chuck.
And at that point, the genie is out of the bottle
and my secret’s out.
So if somebody is brave enough to take the risk to tell you their story,
hear them.
Listen to the words
with an open heart and an open mind.
Because when you hear a story that resonates within you,
that’s empowerment.
When you see somebody walking down the street in public
that reminds you of somebody you want to be,
that’s empowerment.
Advocation breeds education, which fuels empowerment.
And it is a circular journey,
it is symbiotic and it can be ever, ever expanding.
Because every cycle of that breeds more role models,
which, then, creates more resources, which, then, creates more self-confidence.
And I urge all of you to be a part of that change
and support that change.
Now, while I stand in front of you,
being vocal, invisible, and with confidence,
it pains me and gives me shame to tell you
that I will never tell my parents about Savannah.
I will never tell them about her achievements.
I will never tell them about being on this stage.
And I will never tell them
about anything that I’ve done positively for the community.
Because for me, that rejection that I could get from my folks
is my worst fear.
Now, if they come across this talk,
I will take the consequence, good or bad.
But who knows?
Maybe it would just be simply another opportunity
for me to be a better advocate,
to educate them with my story,
and just empower myself.
And that is a risk worth taking.
Thank you.