Secretly, I started reading about ways that I could affirm my true identity, and then I saved up my allowance money and sent off for what I would need.
The day they arrived I spent hours in my room, looking at the wondrous piece of paper that would tell the world what I truly was, over and over between my hands I passed the magic appliance that, once donned, would make my transition complete.
Finally, with great ceremony I bathed and dressed in my new persona and went downstairs to face my family and the world, proud to the soles of my feet for what I had become - imagine my horror when, just as I walked in the kitchen, my father dropped his coffee cup and laughed aloud, beating himself on the head he cried, "Get those damned, funny-looking ears off your head and get ready for school.