"I Meant Everybody"

Instead of focussing on this post, I spent a long time looking for the original charter and e-mails.  I don't know what happened to them, unless I used a different e-mail address at that time.

Several years ago, I received an e-mail invite via Meetup.  It was from Kim Pratt, asking if I wanted to join a clothing swap.  Some time before, I listed a few preferences; I think that was the only one that wasn't specifically t-oriented.

Again, I wish I could have found the original e-mail.  The salutation said

Ladies!

and it went on to assume we were all women as it described her vision of a clothing swap.

She also wrote "everyone is welcome."

I wrote back and said "well, I'm not sure I'd be welcome" and told her that I was a crossdresser but I had clothing to swap and I liked the idea of getting "new to me" clothes.

She wrote back immediately and pointed out that she specifically said "everyone is welcome" and she meant it.  We wrote a bit, she put me at ease and I went to a swap.  I think I went in drab to the first one; I don't recall.  I've gone in drag and drab over the years.  Kim has given me some dresses that didn't fit her (or her daughter).  She took me out to a nearby store to shop and then let me do my makeup at her place so we could go all the way up to Baltimore to a small trans get together, my first ever.

Kim Pratt did more than she'll ever know to help Meg meet and greet the world.  She never failed to treat me as a friend or girlfriend as appropriate.

She's a wonderful woman who runs the swaps mostly so she can get clothing to give to charity.  She sometimes has a special target, a particularly needy woman or family, that she's collecting clothes for.  Although we can all use some extra money in these times she never makes money on these swaps and in fact gives of herself more and more every time.

Kim Pratt is a mom, wife, veteran, friend of the t-community (her swap co-leader is trans), and one incredible lady.

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