Fun_People Archive
26 Feb
Sex Change at the Registry of Motor Vehicles

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Wed, 26 Feb 97 14:36:20 -0800
To: Fun_People
Subject: Sex Change at the Registry of Motor Vehicles

[The text of a letter published in the Boston Globe for 2/26/97...  -psl]

Sex Change at the Registry of Motor Vehicles

Your February 20 article about the Registry of Motor Vehicles says that some
people were sent multiple copies of their new licenses. Please let me
correct your statement that "The glitch is the first defect with the state's
2-year-old, stat-of-the-art.. system." Last month I got my license renewed.
The new license informed me that my sex is "F." In previous years, on the
license and elsewhere, my sex had always been "M." I am certain of it. My
mother backs me up on this, and my beard lends further, if not conclusive,
weight to my contention. I took the new license to the clerk who had
processed it, but she (he?) refused to talk to me. I then xeroxed the
license and mailed the copy to Governor Weld, asking him to use his powers
as Governor to change me back.  The Governor did so without hesitation. (I
am glad that John Silber did not become Governor -- I suspect that he would
have told me, concisely and precisely, that one must learn to take the cards
that life deals one, and do so without whining.) A sex change in the
commonwealth of Massachusetts costs $33.75, which these days is a bargain.
But while it was interesting to see how the other half lives, I enjoy being
a guy. So thank you, Governor Weld. You have made a man of me.

Marc Abrahams
Editor, Annals of Improbable Research
Cambridge MA

© 1997 Peter Langston