This is the second biography of Katherine Cummings. Her first biography "Katherine's Diary: The Story of a Transsexual" was published in 1992. Katherine Cummings was an icon of the Australian transgender movement, librarian, sailor, activist for transgender people, award-winning author; she worked at Sydney’s Gender Centre – an organization set up in 1983 to help people with gender issues – and was the information worker and edits the Centre’s quarterly magazine Polare.
In 2015, I interviewed Katherine for my blog and this is what she told me about this publication: "The original title of the essay was “The Life and Loves of an XY Woman”, but since then the terms ‘X Generation’ and ‘Y Generation’ have become commonplace and I didn’t want to have the XY of the male chromosome confused with them so I changed the title.
The term ‘lesbian’ was thrown in slightly tongue-in-cheek, as I think the terms ‘gay’, ‘lesbian’, ‘hetero’ etc are very confusing for the lay reader, and to tell the truth, I don’t think I fit any of the boxes. All my relationships have been with women, before and after transition, but I base my relationships on people’s minds and characters, not on their gender, and I have been lucky to find a series of women who fitted my concept of a constant companion. For a long time, I thought if the right man came along I could be hetero, but he never did. Two came close but they are both dead now and at eighty the concept of sex as a pursuit or goal has lost its charm. I am too busy using up my remaining time on more important matters, like writing."Katherine passed to the other side in 2022. You were my best friend, you were my second mother. Rest in peace my Angel. I miss you so much.
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