Four years, is it really possible? Four years, what did I think this place would look like? Could I have ever envisioned where I am in my life and what the past 1460 days have felt like, looked like, even have smelled like?
It has been an extraordinary one thousand four hundred and sixty days, four trips around the sun and countless trips to the therapist and words, reams and reams of words. Words of despair, words of joy, words of gratitude disbelief and amazement.

The world looks very different than I supposed it would, but I think that is true of everything in life. The truth of the matter is that we project the way that we will feel and interact with the world using the way we feel now. The trouble with that thinking is that four years later I am not nearly the person that I was. I honestly don’t feel I would recognize myself from four years ago and as I continue to change and evolve I wonder what I will look and feel like four years from now.

I will say the most astounding thing that I’ve learned is that is never too late to make a change, big or small, it matters not. Humans have such an amazing ability to adapt, the survival instinct is something not to be underestimated.

I do know that I have committed to moving forward with the final chapter of my physical transition to Rachel. Today I made the down payment on my shiny new vagina, that’s what I’ve gotten to calling it, a slightly irreverent reference to something that is almost mystical and definitely spiritual. I have lived with the fantasy of this my entire life and in truth it has always been a fantasy, not in a sexual sense but that the person that I was did not have the courage and could not ever even imagine having that kind of courage.

Now that the ground work is done now that the commitment has been made I can get down to contemplating all of those messy details. Like I don’t know the first thing about vaginas real or otherwise, I wonder if it will come with a handbook? “Vaginas for Dummies” for example. I’ve never seen support groups, meetups or adult educations seminars on the care and maintenance of said body part. I’ll have to place an ad and see if I can find a tutor.