Betsy Ann, Girl Talk, And Ensuing Confusion

The year was 1950 and I was 3 years old. My next-door neighbor was Betsy Ann. We were besties… actually only’s because there were no other children in my neighborhood. In her back yard we would run and play, make mud pies, chase each other amidst squeals of delight until Mom would holler for me to come on home. Other days were spent in her bedroom, having tea parties, playing make believe. I would change into her Sunday best dress and I was the mommy, she the daddy. That is until one day… I heard Mom speaking with her mother and then she came up the stairs, walking in and seeing me dressed in the silk and lace as was little girl’s style back in that day. Roughly she commanded, “Get on your clothes and come home!”

Nothing was said then, but there was a strange look on her face. Later that night, she came in to tuck me into bed. She kissed me good night and said, “That’s my little boy.”

“Mama?” I quietly said. “I’m a girl.”

There was that look again, then anger. “No, you are not! I don’t want to hear any more of that nonsense from you again, do you hear me?”

Her voice frightened me. I nodded yes. There were no words for transgender in those days. It wasn’t until two years later that the news spread across the country of Christine Jorgensen who had reassignment surgery in Europe before returning to America. I’ve no idea whether my parents saw it or not. I do remember so clearly the details of that night however, even at such a young age. That look on her face? I only realized years later that what I saw in the face of the strongest woman I’ve ever known was fear. Starting that night began a performance lasting for decades as I tried to be the little boy, then man that they wanted me to be. Even though I knew deep inside it wasn’t true. As I suggested, it’s not like we had words for what was going on. I just no longer knew who I was, and the search to find out would be a painful one. My parents set out starting then to as I laughingly today call it, “butching me up.” Cowboy clothes and toy guns. Footballs for presents. I would often in the years to come, leave the house with the latest toy six shooter, then lend it to other kids while I would prefer making a house out of an old box, living in my imagination albeit without the gun. There was no one to play football with and when Dad tried to play catch with me, he learned early on that sports just was not my thing. Bless his heart he would get so frustrated, despite my really trying.

Photos from that time often betrayed a sadness in those little eyes. Still, I gave it my best shot. I’d be the best boy ever… until I didn’t. Circa ’51, we packed up and moved to Tyler, Texas. There I would grow up in the Rose Capital of the World, located right next to the East Texas oil fields. Texas would bring new challenges, and a new accent, the one I carry to this day. I’ll pick up the story there in my next post.

Earliest Memories

As we age, only a few memories fully stand the test of time. Sometimes moments of joy, other times moments of fear. Probably my earliest memory was riding one day in Illinois (I know it was Illinois because I was a toddler at the time), and we pulled over by a large crevasse with a steep incline. Daddy tried to get me to come closer to the edge, but I was frightened out of my wits. “No!” I screamed.

He seemed frustrated, and the next thing I knew, he swept me up in his arms, carried me to the edge and held me out to look, all the while yelling at me to stop crying. Mom intervened, but I was shaken to my core. The tears just flowed for a time. Looking back, I’m sure Dad was sorry, but in that time, sorry was not something many men said. Indeed, with age, I’ve learned to forgive a lot. He had a huge temper, and on occasion he could be wrong. Like the rest of us.

My next memory was of my playing in our home. We rented from a woman who lived in a room upstairs. Mom had the front door latched and was busy cleaning house. Quietly I pushed a chair to the door, climbed up in the chair and unlatched the door of our Olney, Illinois home. There was a hospital across the street and beside it could be found a filling station, and they guys who worked there were always nice to me, offering a candy bar and sometimes a toy. A busy highway ran in front of the house. Off I went, crossing the highway and to the service station. They called mom. “Mrs. Wicks, are you missing someone?” Not long after, she was there threatening to wear out my britches, amidst profuse thanks to the station employees.

Other memories pop up on occasion. There was a separate breed of white squirrels in Olney, and they were protected by law. They would literally eat out of my tiny hand and I would get so excited! Then there was the day during a brutal winter when a large sewer rat entered our home through the coal heating ducts. We shoveled our own coal, or rather my Dad did. I walk into the kitchen. He’s staring at me on the kitchen table, from my perspective assessing me as a possible meal. He runs towards me and again, screams and panic. To this day, I react to rats or mice with a rush of adrenaline favoring flight over fight.

On another day, I’m outside playing as Mom is raking leaves and burning them in the gutter on the street. There was an empty basket lying around. What a perfect toy. I put it over my head and am walking around blind to where I was going. I step on the curb and tumble right into the fire! I jump running for dear life, Mom chasing me, and my sleeve on fire. She finally catches me and throws me to the ground, using her coat to smother the flames. Besides my birth, the first time I get to visit a hospital conveniently across the street. Some second-degree burns, but I heeled without any scarring. Somehow, I always had to learn life lessons the hard way.

I remember the little girl next door with whom I played. I’ll say more about that in my next post. What happened would affect my life for decades to come. I can speak today of things totally beyond my ability to make sense of for so very long. Two back to back experiences would be transformative in my world view. But that’s a whole other story.

What's In a Name

In my last post, I mentioned the name I was given at birth. Few who did not know me before my gender transition have heard that name before. At one time I referred to that as my “dead name” but not anymore. I suppose with age, I’ve processed the pain I felt during those years. I’m also very comfortable in heart and soul, and I suppose that past does not feel so threatening. It’s a bit like gender transition, when early on I strove to live the feminine energies within, ignoring the rest. I believe many of us possess both the feminine and the masculine within but gender roles and expectations tend to polarize us.

My birth name was Grady Roland Wicks II, named after my father. It served as a good place holder while I sorted out who I really was. I went by Roland during those years, but please do not call me that now. I think the reason why is obvious, but for those who do not understand, it negates the gender journey I had to take to be true to self.

In the Hebrew Bible in the book of Bereshit (Genesis), we see people regularly changing names as their roles within the Biblical narrative comes to fruition. Abram becomes Abraham which means exalted father, father of a nation. Jacob (which means supplanter, held by the heel) becomes Israel (he who struggled with G-d and prevailed). Sarai is renamed Sarah etc. It was clear that names in those days had meaning, and I believe still do.

Most of us carry the name that was chosen by our family, though some do change their name. My wife for instance did not care for her middle name, so she took the name Willobeth for her middle name, in tribute to a beloved aunt in my family. I’ve been blest in this life to get to choose my name not once but twice in this lifetime. When I began transition, I chose the name Jessica Rolanda Wicks. This was by a court order which also changed my gender identifier on my documents. I go by Jessica or Jessi or Jess, but my legal name is Jessica. My reasoning was simple. I have always appreciated women who are strong in mind and heart. There was a news reporter at the time named Jessica Savitch. Then there were other Jessicas, like Jessica Tandy and Jessica Lange, strong women in their own right. Rolanda was chosen to carry that piece of my former life going forward.

But… another opportunity for a name change presented itself. When I completed my conversion to Judaism, we are called to choose a Jewish name. I spent some time soul searching that one. But eventually I did. My first name is יסכה (Yiskah). It means foresight, being able to see the potential in the future. She is mentioned only once in Genesis 11:29, the daughter of Haran, niece of Abraham. That she was mentioned suggests her importance at the time, perhaps as a prophetess in that small community. It can be pronounced Yiskah or Iskah. It is the earliest form of the name Jessica. My middle name is רחל, Rachel, which means Ewe or Sheep in Hebrew, but my derivation is my Mother’s name. Her name was Rachel, and to me it represented a tremendous inner strength and is a tribute to her memory. While her feelings about homosexuality, never mind transgender were clear, and she once said that should she ever find out either my ex or I was gay, she would go to court to take our daughter. So I could never share that with her, but regardless she was in so many ways a good woman and her strength in the midst of adversity was an amazing teacher for all that was to come. We became quite close in her later years and I miss her terribly. My father taught me to debate and see both sides of an argument. My Mother taught me how to cook, and served as a model of inner strength. So today I am known alternatively as Jessica or Yiskah Rachel, and this woman found herself in the experiences of the woman formerly known as Roland. Names mattered to the patriarchs and matriarchs, and to me as well.

My Roots

I suppose any decent memoir should begin saying a bit about how I came to be. fI certainly believe what came before forms us in ways we don’t always realize.


My Dad, Grady, grew up in a small agricultural community called Forest Hill near Petty, Texas. His parents (and he) worked in the cotton fields as sharecroppers. How did this come to be?


The Wicks side goes back to Southeast Tennessee, and before that, Alabama and Virginia. The earliest verified ancestor on that side dates from the early 1800’s. There’s a Wicks Cemetery Road still by the old homestead near Fayetteville, Tennessee. Some of them were killed in the Civil War, but Dad’s grandfather made his way to Bonham, Texas. After his wife died, he remarried a much younger woman. Hard times and some family drama (that younger woman I mentioned) left my Grandpa Jimmy Wicks to take up sharecropping to survive. I’ve got lots of stories about him and his wife Ollie, but I’ll work that in later. It was hard work and harder times for Dad growing up. He was all prepared to move to Alaska when he finished the 10th grade (the school didn’t go longer than that in their rural community and sharecropping was not his dream job by any stretch). Instead though, his Aunt Johnnye and Uncle Luther convinced him to come stay with them in Amarillo where he could finish school, though he would have to work to pay his way. He agreed and there he finished high school and one year of college before the war started.


Mom, Rachel Ann Williams Wicks, grew up on a farm in Southern Arkansas near the town of Bearden. Her family came there from various areas in the south and east. One line in her ancestry traces all the way back to the 1500’s where our forefathers worked in the constabulary at Windsor Castle. For years I had heard we were related to the Tudors, but my research shows that story probably found its origin because our family worked where they did. Mom was one of the most independent minded women I’ve ever known, with a fierce temper and the heart to back it up. In her rural Arkansas community when she was 17, a preacher “preached her into hell” and she knew she needed to leave. She packed up on her own, moved to Little Rock where she attended business school. After finishing that she moved to Amarillo, and that is where she met Dad.


In Amarillo mom found a job with American General Insurance and her desk was by the window on the second floor. Across the street was a service station. There my Dad worked paying his way in college. This was an era before air conditioning, and he saw her and would walk across the street and talk with her. Eventually he asked her out to go dancing and she said yes.


Funny story here. He had already asked someone else out. So he arranged to set the other woman up with his brother, so he could date Mom. The other person was not too happy though she did go along, but my parents to be hit it off right away. On Christmas Day, 1940, they drove across the state line and were married at Duncan, Oklahoma by a Justice of the Peace.


World War II happened in ‘43, and Dad was sent to California, then to the Pacific where he worked in an engineering unit with the US Army Air Corps building air strips at various islands during the war. Mom worked in a bomb factory for a time, and when he came back, well, like a whole lot of other folks back then, they began to think about a family. Dad had a job as surveyor and they were living in Oklahoma City for a time.


There in Oklahoma City at St Anthony Hospital at 8:11 PM on July 9, 1947, I was born. Named Grady Roland Wicks II (after my Dad) with the gender marker saying “boy.” I would go by the name Roland, they decided. They got that whole gender and name thing wrong, but how could they know? Mom and I stayed in the hospital for a week before coming home. Nothing was wrong, but they just did that back then. The total bill was less that $200.00. Imagine that today! It was on that hot July day that my story began to play out. Those stories coming in future posts.