RANSVESTIA

lessons. The next hour was devoted to learning how to apply all sorts of cosmetics. When she had finished and had combed my wig into a new style, I hardly recognized myself as I studied my reflection in the mirror. I was looking at a fairly attractive blonde — I wish I could say that I was beautiful but I wasn't. As I looked at myself, I felt very feminine and

told Helen so.

She laughed and said, “You just think you do. Wait until your hair grows out and you sleep on curlers — and when the hormones are really working and your hips and breasts are larger- - then, dear, you'll feel feminine. Right now, you are just a girl awakening to her femininity.”

After dinner, we went into the living room and Helen handed me a German language book. “Start reading," she said.

I smiled to myself at the joke I was about to pull on sweet little Helen and the Corps. I studied the beginner's phrases and hesitantly stumbled through the pronunciation of them. Helen shuddered at the way I had fractured them. She pronounced them correctly and coached me as I tried again. After about five minutes, she shook her head and said she really had her work cut out to teach me German.

"Don't give up," I said, "let's try it again." I picked up the book, opened it to the middle and started reading. She sat there with her mouth open for a minute, then exclaimed, "Darn you, you already know German, don't you?"

"Yes," I replied, “and I also know French as well as German." She laughed and threw a French phrase at me. No more English was spoken that evening.

The next morning we went through the same routine. I showered and dressed. The only makeup was eyebrow pencil and lipstick. After break- fast, we tidied up the house and I received my hormone injection and beard removal treatment. We had coffee and had the voice lessons fol- lowed by the pantomine of Greta's movies. Before dinner, I shaved and changed clothes. Helen supervised the application of makeup and hair combing. All day, though, we exchanged phrases occasionally in either French or German.

As we relaxed after dinner, she asked me why there was nothing in my record book about knowing French and German. I told her that I had taken them as University Extension courses, and although I had made

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