17 songs - My autobiography (8)

2017

On New Year’s Eve I met another chick... or future chick. And we found ourselves talking about us and a bit of things... that I had already acquired, over the latest three to four years. Nevertheless it was pleasant, and our relation was a little better than with others from that famous group. I kept in touch only with Nadja, here and there: and in early February, I announced that I had already moved and she was surprised, at which I replied that the Germans were efficient, and me too (!)
So she paid me a visit around carnival, along with her sister, and we made a quick lunch. 25, from Die Fantastischen Vier, was suggested to me by her.

I had promised to use only suitable clothes anymore, as of January 1st: I got confirmation that I was going to start (at last!) the official care and so.. it was right... that I introduced myself in public just as I had always wanted. I took some exception only for the moving: there were so many small things to move, and I didn’t think I needed a van, so I just did a lot of trips with my little car.
And then there was to clean and settle, as well as (for the umpteenth time) to remove home automation system... and it’s curious to rethink about the estate agency lady who came to see the house a few times and then, a bit strange, she suggested calling a cleaning company to settle all the mess. I looked at her and told that I thought I could do it alone, but that I would’ve followed her suggestion, and she didn’t seem to believe me.
When, after less than three weeks, I handed her the keys... she was surprised at how everything was all right (!)
It's true, people have never understood me. And perhaps not even themselves (!!)

I can’t stop thinking about you from a returning Sting often echoed in radio. And then there was The greatest by Sia, perhaps the first of her songs that really pleased me; and Robbie Williams with Love my life, and Hell.o by Lenny, pretty. And the sweet and original Una cantante di musica leggera by Francesco Tricarico with Arisa (from these two you wouldn’t have said that... it would come out something sensible!)
And Don’t you know, again by Kungs, and Bad ideas from Alle Farben; Biffy Clyro returned with Re-Arrange, very beautiful: cause I would never break your heart / I would only re-arrange.

And so we get at Sanremo Festival... and one morning I listen to part of a song and I say here it is, this is really a beautiful melody, with nice sounds and... magically, it turns out being Occidentali’s Karma! With which Francesco Gabbani wins the aforementioned festival... and I keep playing it for months!
A genius, a great one. Amen had been just the appetizer and the rest of the album we will hear later in the year... it'll be as good.

February also took away Leone di Lernia, unfortunately. The only good guy from Puglia, as I had been repeating for years (!)
Anyways, he had a somewhat proper age but... that is to say, he was a contemporary of Berlusconi... (!!)
I'm sorry, and all those who listen to the 105 Zoo are sad as well. We get to honor his memory with a thousand things... that he has produced, and are convinced (at least I am) that what people call trash is actually anything but him.
Oh, and Robert Miles. This is not 2016, and fortunately deaths of singers and artists are only sporadic, say physiological: But Roberto Concina... I was so tied to him, as we know. Perhaps thanks - or blame - to Irene, or perhaps simply because that music, those sounds... were the ones I loved. And Fable came back to my mind, and those days of summer 1996 and then that movie from a couple of years after, inspired by Cinderella, which used Fable as the soundtrack...
Now I was a woman, at least on paper: and so I looked at the movie, with the dreamer girl but strong and I... I identify myself perfectly.

Il conforto featured a beautiful Tiziano Ferro song (with Carmen Consoli), after a long time: per non farti scappare chiusi la porta e consegnai la chiave a te / adesso sono certa della differenza tra prossimità e vicinanza e sarà che piove da luglio il mondo che esplode in pianto / sarà che non esci da mesi sei stanco e hai finito i sorrisi soltanto…

And so we get to my birthday. Well, an important number  ... and even though still in the wrong clothes, I spend it at the Spa along with that chick, the good insurancer which I had known as I purchased the other house... which in the end of January comes to me to apply for a loan.
And - spoiler - after almost one year and in spite of the promises (and a signed contract) she hasn’t even given me back 10% of the sum, all in all conspicuous. I write this... just because in the end I have to thank her: without this latter joke by humans, I wouldn’t have understood what it was (really) the problem...
Anyway the chick had behaved really good as a consultant for a year and a half; then she started to not answer to emails, at which I already wanted to send her to hell or change company. Then... I decided to probe a little reactions, as we know, at year-end: and so when we finally met for a matter of working I had mentioned about myself and... well, at that time I still need to be told that we would remain friends and that wasn’t a problem.
After that thing of the loan... and the situations that ensued, I finally understood.

The birthday was nice and the Roses sauna, in some days reserved only for women, looked like a good idea (!)
For the rest, however, I found myself crying again. Because the therapies that were supposed to start on January 1st and then at the end of February... now they were set for late April. And the thing that depressed me (besides time passing so uselessly) was that no one cared about promises made and not kept. Not even here, even with a medical issue at stake: yes, indeed, a problem like nothing...
As I said to the doctor in a final meeting (because we had to start meeting only after a few months of hormones therapy), had it been a heart attack or a cancer, perhaps there would’ve been more diligence. And even friends... but not so much as friends, rather as experts in the field for having been into that too, they were unable to give me dates, exact numbers...
I sent Nadja to hell, when she wasn’t able to give an answer to my simple questions. And also the other Lisa, the friend from New Year's Eve, for the same reasons. More fun, if you want, it was meeting Christian for once in the right role: the bright side was his attitude, not rising any problem and even saying that he was surprised at my sentences related to the fear that people, including at work, were possibly not going to accept me anymore.
At least that, here it was not happening. But... from the point of view of relationships or rather generic considerations... I listened again a bunch of nonsense - that made me safely say don’t ever work again with this one (!)
Thinking back at it, we had gathered because, after having sent him (as to anyone by now) several links concerning car accidents and deaths from his neighbourhood... finally he had apologized for his indecent behavior in work issues! And this made him, though as jerk (!!!) definitely better than many italians and more.

Head down, I went ahead. The lousy house in maphialand couldn’t be sold and the pigs kept on trying to fool me. If nothing else, the stock continued to rise and also the stumbling block regarding French elections was passed by. Some attacks here and there but... all ok (!!)
I go out dressed and do everything without problems, and it has almost become normal. One evening I have dinner with people and talk a little about me and... there are no issues: just a moment of fear, because I look in the mirror, skirt, face, foreign language, strangers...
I wonder did it have to happen to me?
Yup.

Bungalow from Bilderbuch and I kenn vo wo by Seiler und Speer are two nice German songs of those months. And then there were also Spostato di un secondo by Marco Masini and Caduto dalle stelle by Mario Venuti, both beautiful. Solo per un po’, by the obviously gay Michele Bravi (!) author of a beautiful song in sounds and words. And then the Thegiornalisti which, as someone from Italy said, are the real stars of this year: Riccione, Pamplona along with the always great Fabri Fibra (which will also get on with the simply gorgeous Stavo pensando a te), and thus their collaborations with Nina Zilli and Giusy Ferreri. Nina Zilli who, remembering Mi hai fatto fare tardi, reminded me of the usual hypocritical phrases from filthy human... when I said I was afraid of being late in life and the trekker minger or some pseudo friend told me it isn’t a race...
Then, they got married to the first crazy crap they happened to meet, just to not remain alone. Luckily then they get divorced or beaten (!!!)

Lust for Life, by Lana del Rey along with The Weeknd. Legendary from Welshly of Arms and you know the truth can be a weapon to fight this world of ill intentions / 'cause we're gonna be legends gonna get their attention / what we're doing here ain't just scary it's about to be legendary / yeah, we're gonna be legends gonna teach 'em all a lesson.
Needless to specify who are we talking ‘bout (!)

And then 50 shades of colors by Lodovica Comello, a little product with a nice and beautifully colored videoclip. Ok by Robin Schulz now with James Blunt, just perfect together! It bodes well, this too... everything will be ok!
And Attention by Charlie Puth, again very beautiful. Wall of glass from a revived Liam Gallagher, and the fabulous and very sweet Mind if I stay by Kadebostany: do you mind if I stay? And listen to the universe / you may find an answer / love is here and everywhere / don’t be scared...
And then Mi sono rotto il cazzo dello Stato sociale! And Thunder, from Imagine Dragons, which reminds me of Max Tortora who plays and tease its refrain 
And a special mention for Reghetton di merda by Paolo Noise from the 105 Zoo: the perfect description of what is Latin American music!


And so, in short, more or less confident we come to the end of April. I make the first medical visit, we book the next three for various seekings and set an appointment in late May. The friend (so to speak) from the loan is close to me and, well, it seems all right. The new house is nice - a bit cold but bearable and the view is gorgeous! I start to plan and then to install a home automation version along with colored lamps in every room.
Physically, they tell me I'm fine. Just a couple of little things, but normal. I cry more often because... even if I go around at most two or three times a week, that one thing about removing body hair and... everything else, it bothers me. However, I do it, with full force and head low, as always.
In going around I don’t have any problem. In stores, all right. Yes, my voice... But it’s more my problem than anything else.
Sure, I don’t get to know neither meet anyone, but anyway it would’ve been the same in the other shoes.
Fatti bella per te, sings Paola Turci, back to sing.

In late May I return to Salzburg after many years and it’s a wonderful day and I feel beautiful... and everything is perfect (including that funny revenging episode in italy!).
Way down we go by Kaleo and Be mine by Offenbach, a future smash, as well as All night by Parov Stevlar (which turns out being dated 2012, and he is Austrian!)
And then Believer by Imagine Dragons, singing out beautiful songs all the time. And Cloud 9 by Jamiroquai, a certainty - including the other single Shake it on. And Find my love of David Thomas. And Depeche Mode storming arenas with their concerts, returned again with Where's the revolution and Going backwards. And Sign of the times by the former One-Direction Harry Styles, pretty but which turned to boring quite quickly.

When I used to cry (or wanted to cry), I listened to Canzone per Federica by Maldestro: sarà la forza di piangere a non lasciarti da sola / sarà il tuo libero arbitrio a incasinarti l'umore / sarà che siamo architetti del nostro stesso dolore / sarà un tuo vecchio nemico il tuo più intimo amico / sarà l'assenza di dio a portarti verso il tuo io.
Beautiful, haunting... deep. And sad. That ma tu, cammina, cammina / accumula strade lasciando che tutto si muova…. it felt like the eternal present - the famous primal fear that everything goes by without a reason. Sarà la forza di piangere...

It’s funny... it's not easy to tell about events which only occurred a few months ago. Or maybe it's because there have been so many great songs and basically only a few significant facts... or it’s because facts have not yet settled into memories?

Not an addict by K's Choice with Skin, original and beautiful. Green light, with Lorde returning. Gli occhi della luna by Ex-Otago with Jake La Furia and those beautiful phrases della luna e delle stelle io mi stupisco sempre / della gente che lavora per niente io mi stupisco sempre / lo giuro che ho visto una macchina andare con dentro qualcuno con dentro niente / ho visto collane far molta più luce di quanta ne produce chi le porta / ho visto che chiunque dimentica il bene ma se fai del male se lo ricorda.
Yep. And so the obvious conclusion e questo è solo un gioco / in cui non vince nessuno...
For you. Your game of deceit, of broken promises, ideals thrown down the toilet at thirty years of age: now it was (and is) clear. Guardando gli occhi della luna che son come i tuoi come i tuoi, so feminine, like she tells me my bank consultant, when I visit her wearing my sheath dress for the first time.

And then the obvious Something just like this by Chainsmokers with Coldplay - on which I mount the filming of an atomic blast 

The Chamber of Commerce, in high heels and blue suit rather seriously and comments, words, almost normality. Take by the chest (again, no pun intended) Irina and ask her for my money, receive random feedback i.e. the usual subhuman delusions like how dare you ask me your money back, since my daughter is not feeling well?
So I decide that I’m done, that I won’t waste a single further word, after a number of text messages and meetings, and I'll go to court. And I also close, finally, my account on the website of the American idiot with the sweatshirt (!!): sick of subhumans who give elbow one another in their dirty and hypocritical lives, or in their buggy comments by buggy minds. Or alleged suitors seeking for friends with benefits or some chick at which yelling are you a trans?
It’s July, and I feel good. I attend to other business meetings and I'm fine. I work or sunbathe or both together (as always!) and I'm fine. Meeting people, talking with neighbors...
Except that, at some point, it all seems to be useless. That is, hormones are doing effect (at least partially) and I feel good and my dresses are there and I like shopping, but...
At one point I wonder why make this change? Extension of the other question for whom am I making myself beautiful? When you are born as a woman it’s different...
And, conversely: did I really cry all my life because I dreamed a skirt, a courtship? Or rather because I wanted - and then receive – fulfilled promises, healthy ideals, a brain...

Hearing in the background Freud by Nek with J.Ax which sings an original song again... I reflect on all of this. I still weep – I’m completely alone and I don’t meet even the one who was passed off as a friend in exchange for money.
But I analyze her behavior and compare this to Irene’s stupid friend... or to my ex-partner when he began to behave like a fool, not compiling bills or whispering nonsense. I think back at Daniela - I wanted to have a child with her and then she raved historical nonsense...
I think back at how much trouble happened to me because I became convinced that I was born in the wrong body: the latter, but also those from 2014 and many more...
I think back to the reality twist. To all those coincidences, which obviously aren’t such. And it occurs to me the idea of writing this book...

And I do realize I'm not a woman: I will never be, I have never been - for how sorry I am. But, above all, there is no need for me to define myself in one way or another: that even if I go around saying I dreamed to put on my bra and I hated to penetrate... it's only a small detail (or problem) - compared to the millions of problems that all the others have.
Who, though, as I now well understand, since they are proud of their genitals... they feel normal. And/or better than me... and free to spit over my head, or suggest holistic doctors as my stoned cousin did or books for self-assertion like the bitch fom the loan.
For one last time, I mean (!)

So, Galway girl, always him: this one is not too bad...
And then Ho fatto in tempo ad avere un futuro by Ligabue, dedicated to the many youngsters (and young men); and even E’ venerdì, non mi rompete i coglioni, funny. And You're in love with a psycho by always good Kasabian, and Walk on water by 30 Seconds to Mars. Flammable, still from Biffy Clyro and Amsterdam by Nothing but thieves, discovered thanks to Virgin Radio. And Sunny days, Armin Van Buuren "no more butterflies, they never last"...
And Volcano by Francesca Michielin, not bad. And perhaps it’s worth quoting Pezzo di me by Levante with Max Gazzè, well studied (!)
But above all Magellano by Gabbani, wonderful! The rhythm, the genius, the voice and that sweat breath heart, yep: exactly! My life.

In 2003 songs made me start thinking that the problem wasn’t me, but the others. People thought/think my sex problem was a blocker, but often it was simply that even just speaking or having anything to do with people of both sexes, it was just annoying. There is little to be done: we are different, and I think I’m better (and I've got evidence, cit.)
I realized, being able to remove the gender factor or rather impulse to fuck (!) from my life, that the whole question has been resized. I'm not saying erased: the opportunity to decide about my body and my name still lies there and that makes me feel good... I still think about it. But, in fact, perhaps it isn’t necessary.

Relations, often made of strength, between men and women; the things that the ones and the others expect and then they do, and then they’re willing to feel sick. I, being somewhat out of those instincts, have never been able to participate at the same level at those games of theirs, but this obviously doesn’t mean that my ideals were worse (indeed).
Only, it became difficult to even get in touch with potential partners or companions. But, you see, it’s also the fact that 90% and more of these fellows would be unacceptable rubbish... people unable to distinguish right from wrong (as I have often repeated for a while of years) and so fearful of expressing a judgment for fear of... boh? of being alone, of not being able to satisfy the carnal desires, yep. And living fake and empty lives - but full of lies.

So now it all Ti fa stare bene, as sung Caparezza. And also Niccolò Fabi came back: Diventi inventi (brilliant) and “far assomigliare la vita ai desideri / ricordarsi di essere sinceri" (!!)
Perhaps he recovered! I'm counting on it. Like she’s also loosely recovering Adele with Water under the bridge... but just barely.


I wanted to be nice and great: and being beautiful in my opinion was a further improvement. Together to my way of thinking, and of seeing sex...
And I loved colors. This was my life... clipped by a series of circumstances. But, I know, having written these four hundred pages... makes me think that not everything has been wasted. Absolutely not.

Myself Into Myself yep, at the end of 2017. At last, or rather endlich :)


But back to the songs, for a brief moment: the beautiful Tell me who by Vanotek, for example! And Whatever it takes (with its special atmosphere related to Euro ) from continuously big Imagine Dragons. And Fino all’imbrunire by Negramaro, undoubtedly always at a good level.


PS: a thought for Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington, dead "painfully" in this year.

Occidentali’s Karma, Francesco Gabbani

Mind if I stay, Kadebostany

Legendary, Welshly Arms

 Afterword

What else should I say...?
Nothing 

Am kidding.

What a long trip over time, though! When I think back at that phrase "my past, so alive and kicking inside of me" written at the beginning of my first story in August thirty years ago... I smile: was I really afraid of losing some memory? And... did I really believe that it was a special past? That is, I hadn’t realized I would’ve photographed everything meticulously...

It’s a biography at the end. A detailed autobiography : moreover: it’s exactly what I meant with soundtrack. And I loved to use the symbolism of Blasphemous rumours song from Depeche Mode as a metaphor to criticize the one who lives in the heavens above ;)
It’s also the story of the boy who wanted to be a princess... finally told without fears.

I especially talked about love... I would say that it is quite logical: music is emotion and then love... or maybe even hate. Or travels, to say. It can hardly be associated with business or current events (or politics).

I notice that I have highlighted three songs per year: which sum up to 123 in total and... she comes to my mind my mom singing Orietta Berti "in via dei ciclamini al 123"  It makes some sense: and this surname of hers, then... (!)
Anyway, there would still be others... many others, meaningful songs to mention: but... I simply can’t. Even if, as I repeated a thousand times (and it’s the nature of this book) my every moment of life is linked to a song...

Rereading, I noticed I’ve reported in much more detail songs belonging to the last ten or fifteen years... than I did in previous times. This somehow makes me happy, because it makes me feel/look less nostalgic  and somehow it’s also logical, because in any case the newer things are better remembered, of course. Net of memories and nostalgia, I mean...
But, behold, there are a lot of songs from the '80s or even later that I remember with affection and that I could associate with any particular moment, but I haven’t inserted them while writing... and I don’t want to go and enter them now. I prefer to ask the reason for this, and, see, I think it's due to maturity, i.e., all the sweet memories of those years you can easily associate with a look, a heartbeat, a disco, dreams of a fulfilling job... trivial or rather simple stuff, I mean. While over more adults years there are always shades... ideas, complicated twist of mind because life has become undoubtedly more complex - not bad, not that! - and a feeling/emotion joins another which then was derived from yet another...
All things which wouldn’t occur when you’re a small kid. Or girl.


There are still three months to go... updates ongoing!

Like... how nice is it, knowing that italy won’t go to World Cup 2018? !!


And always remember: God does not exist and you, my friend, deserve better!

 Afterword/2

Exactly like 30 years ago (!) an appendix is needed. In short, another note, call it what you want.
Because... okay, it was nice and above all sensible (as well as sincere) to have set this biography on that hidden part of me that... dreamed, hoped, cried (and even laughed) in a wrong body. On the other hand, as mentioned, songs lead to feelings, emotions and therefore...
But, here, maybe some facets have gone into the background. Mistakenly ;)
It was 2017, and I wanted to describe everything that way - especially the last year. But... also thanks to what happened after... it is precisely necessary to write two more lines.
The latest trick (the Serbian filth) served to clarify some concepts. Well, first of all that if it weren't for you today I would no longer have a penis... which was my dream, but not surgically :D
And then... that I don't belong on this planet. After all, the very idea of this book well represented this concept, didn't it? Memory, memories, music, ethics...
Honesty. Ideals. In recent months I have thought about Irene and more and... the concept has become clearer: you did not want me? Ok, but was it because you realized that I wasn't a boy or because you understood that I wasn't a jerk like you and your past, present and future lovers? (!)
Rhetorical question, rhetorical answer. And not just against Irene, huh? This applies to... a little bit of everything.
A little bit of my whole life: from the beasts of the middle schools through the high school morons then to the ex-coworkers, the chiropractor and the stoners from across the Alps. There is evidence, don’t warm up, don’t be angry...
Everything is written, everything is clear. But I'm not here to make you moral: I'm here to improve myself.

And to smile at your self-destruction - after all, a proper punishment for behaving so badly towards me !!

 Afterword/3

But music is art, it’s a feeling, it’s that thing that takes you back to a moment in the past from its first notes, and then completely envelop you as the melody unfolds and the notes proceed. You can appreciate it as it is, an end in itself; you can analyze the tools, praise the praises of the artist's voice. But it takes on its highest meaning only when you relate it to your life: a song is born, you listen to it for the first time, maybe it stays in your mind... then it becomes famous, everyone knows it, you can hear it on the radio, around shops, in the disco, in the dark at evening, together with your girlfriend or your friends. In a short time it is everywhere: it becomes the song of those months. Then it starts to become a habit, there is a moment when it suddenly becomes boring: and then it goes to die, after a few weeks you don't hear it anymore. When it re-emerges, maybe after one year, it will mean forever what we have been, what we experienced and thought when that song was in vogue. It’s a metaphor for life itself.
More than an image, more than a smell, a music is intimately linked to what you are at a given moment and becomes part of you.

...

Obviously, at 16/18 your mind is clear: one song joins the memories of your first holiday without parents, another on the first kiss, another on the military visit and another on the high school exam.
At 25 you have one song that tells you about another girl or the time you spent together with your only love, and one that tells you about your first or another job.
At 30 you have songs that talk to you about what you’re doing at the time: roughly the same things you have been doing for ten years now. So it is rarer that some songs can be associated with brand new sensations. On the other hand, it becomes very probable that our brain continually works to associate each old song that we listen to with the memory and the sensations to which it is linked.
It is not clear why that wonderful and delicate organ behaves like this: but it is a fact. And obviously the bigger the part of our life that has already passed, the more space available in the brain is filled with memories and less space remains for the future, that is, for the memories that have yet to be built.

(from Join me, 2000)