My mother's misappreciation of my intelligence.

My mother was very intelligent. However, she never accepted the challenge of intelligence. She was content to ride along on a small ambition. This did not prepare her for the subtleties of raising a child who was even more intelligent than she was--myself. It was evident at graduation from Yale, where she was in attendance, that all of this commotion was a feather in her cap, and that was as far as she was able to take it. Such was the guidance I got from day one at this college. My father was an outsider but at least did not mount an effective obstacle course to it. They all were into emotion and the range of possibilities it allowed. It was this estimate of the potential I had that I played out.

My disappointment at not being taught to read the first day of school went as an anecdote and a curiosity, and this marked the duration of my flirtation with school to the last day of my years at IIT.

It was the sighting of the burning building a la Moses's bush that brought things into allignment. The oversize enlargement of my potential was made greater still by the emotional pettiness I was born into. Ecological forces stepped in and this is continuing to today. Even the comprehension of the Mafia of my potential is rooted in emotional misapprehension. They are right about one thing--I need to work out the significance of my crossdressing and get back on track in the male role path.