To Help Mother. I Became a Girl

Marjorie (55-R-1)

It seems to be the rule when telling of our lives to start by describing our dress. So here I am seated at Miss Elliotts typewriter. I am wearing a black box-pleated skirt with a blue and black blouse with a jewel neckline. One of Miss Elliotts presents too, a gold necklace and drop earrings in my pierced ears. The tiny waist that I have from early corseting, I con- sider my best feature. But I can claim to be fairly good looking. An unusual feature, perhaps for my age, twenty, is waist length hair that I wear piled on my head. Even when young and a boy I wanted long hair probably as ultra feminine.

When I was just

Now, to start at the beginning. two father was killed in a car accident. Mother, of course, got a settlement for herself and for me till my sixteenth year. So she bought a small house on the edge of town and invested the rest of the money. She altered clothing for two stores, so we lived comfort- ably, and the only drawback was there were no child- ren close for me to play with. My only contact with boys was at Sunday School when I became old enough to go. So mother and I were very close, still she never dressed me girlishly, but did keep my hair in a long bob. That was a fashion for some boys at the time so it was not commented upon.

A very old house on large grounds was just past ours. It had been built by a pioneer family but their descendents had gone, and it had been rented for a time, but not kept up. When we moved there it was empty and had a "for sale" sign on it. I used to go over through a gap in the fence to play in the yard which was grown up wild with weeds and untrimmed shrubs. Mother often said she hoped some nice per- son would buy it and fix it up, so she might have a nice neighbor and I have someone to play with.

15.