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By Everett Maroon\nFirst Ed. Booktrope, \u00a9 2012, ISBN 9781935961338, 250 pages
\nSecond Ed. Smashwords, \u00a9 2016, ISBN 9781370241484\n
<\/p>By Everett Maroon
\nFirst Ed. Booktrope, \u00a9 2012, ISBN 9781935961338, 250 pages
\nSecond Ed. Smashwords, \u00a9 2016, ISBN 9781370241484\n
I don\u2019t usually read memoirs, as a rule. I never thought they would interest me. I was wrong. Bumbling Into Body Hair<\/em> is a story of the author\u2019s transition from Jenifer to Everett, and all the emotional, social and psychological transitions that accompanied him along the way.<\/p>\n Told with remarkable humor and poignant honesty, Everett\u2019s tale is sometimes raw, frequently hilarious, always moving. The thing that shines brightest on every page is his courage. Throughout the process, despite his self-doubt and the resistance from his partner and some of his best friends, Everett persists in doing what is right for himself \u2013 which sometimes required him to slow down. Be sure. Think this thing through. Seemed prudent to me, and to his therapist, who is a true gem in this story.<\/p>\n I read with anger, horror, and flat-out shock some of the reactions of people around Everett during his transition. One person on the street literally spit in his face. His bowling league manager asked him to use a special bathroom so as to not upset the other patrons of the alley. A cis-male passenger on the metro stood over him shouting, \u201cAre you a man or a woman?\u201d To each of these painful and awkward moments, Everett brought his own special brand of humor, like shouting back at the guy on the metro, \u201cAre you an idiot? Or an asshole?\u201d I think I actually cheered at that.<\/p>\n It seemed to me that his biggest fear was telling his co-workers, friends and family. How would they react? I won\u2019t spoil it by telling you who said or did what, but I will say that not everyone handled the news well, and I can only imagine the betrayal Everett must have felt from people whose support he needed<\/em> during an already difficult and confusing time. And yet, through faltering relationships and rude strangers and resurrected breasts, the rollercoaster ride of T creams, disastrous experiments with plastic wrap, and learning to use a \u201cpacky\u201d (hint: don\u2019t lay it on the radiator), he maintains his sense of humor and hope for a better life.<\/p>\n But Everett\u2019s gender is only one thread in the larger tapestry of his story. At its heart, Bumbling Into Body Hair is a snapshot, a single episode in a much larger story. Because Life doesn\u2019t hit the pause button while we figure these things out, the daily grind continued to throw the usual obstacles at him throughout his journey of discovery. Every reader, no matter their gender, can find some relatable element of Everett\u2019s story, whether it\u2019s his hectic work schedules, his financial struggles, his tendency to be accident-prone, his social adventures and romantic ups and downs. His first date with Susanne was especially endearing, given that we are riding on Everett\u2019s shoulder and feel with him the awkwardness, his certainty that he will do something<\/em> to screw it up.<\/p>\n My biggest takeaway from this memoir was that those things that matter most to us must<\/em> be pursued. Despite opposition. Despite fear. Despite self-doubt. Each person\u2019s journey is unique, and while others travel with us, alongside us, each of our journeys are undertaken essentially alone. Everett\u2019s determination to bring his outside into agreement with his inside, no matter what, made me stand up and cheer.<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Everett Maroon First Ed. Booktrope, \u00a9 2012, ISBN 9781935961338, 250 pages Second Ed. Smashwords, \u00a9 2016, ISBN 9781370241484 I don\u2019t usually read memoirs, as a rule. I never thought they would interest me. I was wrong. Bumbling Into Body Hair is a story of the author\u2019s transition from Jenifer to Everett, and all the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8n0kX-6K","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3835,"url":"https:\/\/www.dremadeoraich.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/22\/the-murderbot-diaries\/","url_meta":{"origin":418,"position":0},"title":"The Murderbot Diaries","author":"DremaDeoraich","date":"March 22, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"By Martha Wells. 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