A Dahl’s House

For what it’s worth, I posted this over at the Crossdressers.com forum.
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Those of you who are long-time members will remember that I used to post a lot, but lately I’ve been pretty quiet (up to until a few weeks ago) and I just wanted to talk about why.

It’s pretty well known that a number of post-ops “disappear into the woodwork” after transitioning. While I think it’s unfortunate in some ways (because they’re not there to provide role models), I can certainly understand the desire to be “normal” for once in your life. I’ve been doing something similar, albeit for very different reasons.

Part of the reason I haven’t been around here that much is other competing demands on my time (both life in general and being a mod on another forum). Part of it is just the normal dynamic of being a long-term member in a forum where topics tend to repeat themselves. (When you’ve seen threads on favorite panties 17 times before, it just gets hard to muster enough interest to reply to the latest one.)

But mostly it’s because my crossdressing has become just another part of my life. (I do have some advantages here. I live in a trans-friendly area. I’m single, so I don’t have to work through the relationship troubles that coming out to an SO can cause. (There is the whole dating issue, however…)

When I first went out, it was such a new and exciting experience, I felt the need to write about it in great detail each time I did it. But over time, I felt less and less need do so. But unless it was a special occasion, it was being “normal.”

For example, a couple weekends ago this was my en femme outing: going to a boutique to get a leather jacket altered, stopping for a late lunch, checking out the sales at the department stores, realizing it was a clear day and driving up to Twin Peaks to admire the view. In short, pretty similar to a woman running errands on a Sunday afternoon. (And no I didn’t call ahead to any of the stores I visited, I just want there and was treated like any other customer.) At this point it’s just “normal,” nothing to write about.

At this point, I usually go out a couple times a month. Sometimes it’s to trans events, such as a local monthly “girl’s night out” dinner. Sometimes it’s to trans-friendly spaces, like Marlena’s, which hosts the Faux Girls show. (If you want to learn to boost your confidence, hanging out with DQ is a great way—they don’t take nuthin’ from nobody.) But it’s equally like to be going out to dinner with friends, shopping, going out to a local museum or concert, or just hanging out on the town.

So even if I’m not writing about it anymore, you can safely assume this weekend princess is out most weekends—and being treated graciously and respectfully by the vast majority of people I interact with. I’ve told a number friends and several co-workers, who’ve all been pretty accepting. When I go shopping these days, if I’m en homme, I’m upfront that a skirt is for me (and bring along a photo of me en femme to show the sales clerks). In short, while I’m not fully out, it’s now just another (enjoyable) part of my life.

Standard disclaimer: Going out of the house was right for me, it may or may not be right for you. If you’ve got no desire to leave the house, that’s fine, I’m not trying to push you out the door. But for those who’ve been yearning to do so, I just want to let you the world may not be as scary a place as you think.

Some thoughts on the use of the term “community” (in general) in this essay:

Political leaders and political organizations find the word useful as it can be both positive and politically correct; deviant or controversial groups apply the label community as an affirmation.

“It’s spun so thin nowadays,” said Geoffrey Nunberg, a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley. He says the term has become so trivialized as to be an abuse of language—“If you go online, you’ll see the Campbell’s Soup community, people swapping recipes….

The word “community,” from the Latin communitas, dates back to the 14th century and means “a group of people who share a common interest or experience,” said Jack Chambers, a linguistics professor at the University of Toronto.

“The community is literally the making of some common ground,” he explained. “It’s a sort of self-defining word. If you put a modifier with it—the North Toronto community, the linguistic community—you immediately get a distribution of folks.”

It has retained its original meaning, he said. But it has certainly expanded, which experts attribute largely to globalization and the Internet.

With the advent of the Web, members of various “rare-diseases communities” are able to find someone else in the world who understands their pain. People who make up the hypochondria community find others who validate their fears. Those in the “questioning community” (which has been appropriated as part of the ever expanding term LGBTQ: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender/ Transsexual, Queer/Questioning) can find others who share their sexuality questions.

“Physical location is no longer a constraint,” said Charles Boberg, a McGill University professor who specializes in sociolinguistics. “Local communities are decimated by this process of multiplying non-local allegiances to the point where many of us know the people we communicate with on the Internet better than we know who we live next door to.”

The positive side of all this is that people are able to choose the community they would like to join, which can be a liberating experience, said Prof. Boberg.

Andrea posed this question over at the Betty boards and I was struck by people’s honesty in sharing their fears. For myself:

...if I knew that I wouldn’t hurt me professionally. I don’t think it would, but who wants to find out the hard way.

...if wouldn’t cause my family to worry. I’m pretty sure they’d be accepting. But I can see where they might be worried for me.

Initially when I answered the question, I mentioned being worried about being ostracized by people I know. But on reflection, I realize all my friends and acquaintances who I’ve told have been pretty accepting. If I come out to someone who’s not—well, then they weren’t really good friends anyway.

But one thing does give me pause:

...if my crossdressing wouldn’t overshadow everything else when people think of me. (Sort of like how it’s never “comedian Eddie Izzard,” it always seems to be “transvestite comedian Eddie Izzard.”) I’m perfectly happy to be seen as a crossdresser—it’s just that “crossdresser” is only part of who I am.

So for the time being, selective disclosure works for me.

I was at Carla’s the other day to get my brows waxed, when a crossdresser from Texas called wanting to know if Carla would sell him a lingerie bag—you know the kind you use to keep your delicates from getting trashed in the washing machine. Carla sensibly told him to just go to the drugstore and buy one. After all, no one was going to know that his wife/girlfriend hadn’t asked him to buy one.

But that’s how paranoid many closeted trans people are. While in reality, people are remarkably oblivious, we’re paranoid that we’re going to do something and the entire store is going to point and laugh. I describe it to my gay and lesbian friends, that it’s like being homosexual before Stonewall. Not exactly alike, since trans folks don’t risk being cart off to jail, etc. just for being out in public. But the sense of fear is all too familiar.

It’s liberating to get past it. But trans activists, who are out and usually have been out for awhile, would do well to remember just how crippling that fear can be. Even now, having worked through it, it’s still one reason I’m “public but not fully out.” If I came out fully, probably nothing major would happen. In fact, having a respectable somewhat-known-in-his-field person come out probably would help in its little way towards gaining acceptance. But the thing is, I think it wouldn’t harm my career, but it’s that not knowing for sure… that makes what makes it hard to turn the knob on the closet door.

Tomorrow is the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance, created to memorialize those who were killed—more than one person per month over the last decade—due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice. For me, this year it’s personal, since I got to know the mother and sister of a transwoman, Krystal Heskin, who was killed near Chicago last April.

Locally, there will be events in both San Francisco (starting at 6:30 p.m. at the San Francisco LGBT Center, 1800 Market Street with a march to Congregation Sha’ar Zahav, 16th and Dolores streets, for a memorial event starting at 7:30) and in San Jose (7 p.m. at the Billy DeFrank LGBT Community Center, 938 The Alameda). Join us.

While there’s sometimes acrimony between the LGB and T communities—and sadly too often within the T communities too—it’s worth remembering that those who hate us—and sometimes attack and even kill us—don’t bother with the sort of distinctions we sometimes obsess over ourselves.

Finally, much as it’s important to remember our dead, it’s equally important to remember our living. There are still many fights to be fought. Crossdressers in particular need to become engaged. On various crossdressing forums, it’s not uncommon to hear the complaint: “but women can wear whatever they want.” (Which ain’t exactly true, but that’s another post.) Guess what, women earned the right to wear pants, to have a broader range of gender expression.

Crossdressers are notoriously politically inactive (although it should be noted that while crossdressers rarely leave the closet, a number transsexuals disappear back into the woodwork as soon as they’re able). So the “transgender” organizations end up being predominently made up of transsexuals, and not surprisingly, even with the best of intentions, it’s their interests that become top priority. I’m not saying their concerns are unimportant, just that we crossdressers have our own concerns that are also important—and it’s unrealistic to expect them to be given top priority if we’re having some else carry our water for us. So if we want our voices to be heard, we need to speak up for ourselves.

(Admittedly, it’s tough. The Catch-22 is that because of the stigma, the vast majority of us are reluctant to put ourselves in a position where we may be in the public eye. How many transsexuals would out themselves if they could avoid it? I’m still figuring out how to negotiate the issue of activism and privacy myself. It would a lot easier if I were just fully out, but I confess I’m not quite ready for that step yet.)

But act we must.

A lesbian SO’s treatment by some folks at Southern Comfort 2006 conference.

This month I’d meant to get serious about updating the blog more regularly, but a recurrent sinus infection had other ideas….

But a story in today’s paper about how some kids are tiring of social networking sites and turning to face-to-face interactions seemed like a sign that it was time to write about some of the face-to-face meetings of my own.

It’s been a busy month, with various people I know from the Crossdressers.com and MHB forums visiting town. First was a dinner with Erica, then with Lilia (both up in San Francisco) and then last week with Diane here on home turf. I had a lovely time for all three. In various ways, we’ll all in similar places.

Don’t get me wrong—without online forums, none of us would have met. But there’s nothing like being able to sit down over a good meal with someone.

Which is why I’m so looking to dinner Wednesday—Erica is back in town unexpectedly, and we’ll be joined by our female friends Patsy, Marla and Kew.

Jenny Boylan’s “She’s Not There: A Life in Two Genders” is a wonderfully written account of her life pre- and post-transition. Her keynote speech to the recent Southern Comfort Conference Jenny once again made cry. Here’s the complete unedited text of her speech:

Hi everybody. Gosh, look at you all. You all look fantastic from up here. I don’t think I’ve ever been in a room before with so many large women.

(improvised joke #1)

(improvised joke #2)

I notice that some of you look a little tired today. Which is not to say, you don’t look fabulous, I’m just saying that some of you seem like you were up kind of late last night. Did you check out the parties last night? You know the one I mean, the theme party—Come as Your Favorite Nude Author?

(beat)
First time in my life I’ve ever been in a room full of a hundred and fifty nude Kate Bornsteins.

(improvise joke #3)

I have to be honest and say I feel a little bit like a fraud up here today, because I know that there are so many of you who are so much more articulate about these issues than I am. I am an English teacher from Maine, a storyteller— what I’m not is a therapist, or scholar of gender studies, or for that matter, much of an activist. I’ve tried doing some of those things sometimes, because I want to do my part, but I have to say I just so lame at them. I’m grateful that there are people doing all the work around the country that’s being done on behalf of people like us, including the organizers of this conference—our fabulous chairwoman, Kristen, as well as heather O’malley and Cat Turner, and Lola Fleck. I’m just as grateful for all the people who came before me, who blazed the trail that has made my life easier.. I know I would not be here without them, quite literally.

There is an old saying that I find true for me this afternoon—one reason I am able to see so far is because I stand on the shoulders of giants.

If there is anything that I CAN do, it’s to tell a story, and the thing I want to talk to you about today is the value of telling our stories. I must have met thousands of transgendered people over the last few years, and heard thousands of different tales. I was psyched of course, by the success of my own book, She’s Not There, and it was very cool that the media picked up on it, and gave me the chance to talk about our issues on Oprah, and Larry King, and the Today Show, and on CBS’ 48 Hours. But occasionally when I meet with other transgender people, they give me this hangdog look, and say, I wish they would tell my story. (implying, of course, instead of yours, Jenny Boylan, ye *******.)

To which all I can say is, I couldn’t agree more. The media is very comfortable telling one particular type of story, and it’s usually the tale of a kind of old-school MTF transsexual like me. I know you’ve all seen those documentaries, becaue they’re always the same. You have the shots of the TS woman as a boy, the school picture played against some sad new age piano music; you have the interviews with the stunned friends, the heartbroken spouses, the bewildered children. You have the woman in question sitting in front of a mirror, combing out her long blonde hair. And always, always, these stories end with a trip to a surgeon’s office, and the last shot is always of our heroine in some hospital bed, high as a kite on Demerol, saying, I feel so happy.

I don’t know about you but if I see one more show that views surgery as the most important thing in a transgendered person’s life, I’m going to scream. It’s as if they wanted to do a documentary on Jewish people’s lives, and all they could talk about was the bris.

(If this joke gets no response, follow up with: You know what the bris is, the circumscison? Are there any Jews here at all?)

And I can tell you how frustrating it is to see these shows because, guess what, I was IN a bunch of those shows. And they always want to get a shot of you putting on your panty hose. And I want to say, did you get a shot of Toni Morrison putting on HER panty hose? Did you get a shot of Anna Quindlen putting on HER panty hose? Did you get a shot of Steven King—well, anyway.

What’s frustrating about it is that there are so many other stories out there, and they all desparately need to be told, so that all of our stories can become familiar. We need to hear stories about trans men, we need to hear stories about cross dressers, we need to hear stories about people who are grateful for their gender diference, stories with humor, and love, and affection, instead of the usual blah blah blah about wrecked marriages and heartache and people sobbing until their eyes are tired. I’m not saying those aren’t important, and true, tales to tell of our experience, but you know, I think we’ve heard those stories. Now let’s hear some of the others, the ones in which you see people enjoying their lives, the ones in which, believe it or not, some of us are even grateful for the thing that makes us different.

One very good reason to start telling all of these stories is so that when people hear about a transgender person, they recognize the wild variety in our experience. And when I say “people’ I don’t just mean the kind of straight, clueless audience out there who has no idea what our stories are. I’m talking about us. Even we—the people in this room and our brothers and sisters throughout this country and around the world—sometimes forget that there are about a million different ways of being transgendered. There is no one single narrative, and there is no one single way of “doing it right.” IN fact, what you may want to do, or need to do, regarding your own adventure with gender, is likely to change over the course of a long life. For some of us, it may even change over the course of a single day.

The theme of the conference this week is, The Times of Our Lives, and I hope you’ll all take part in the special events that have been planned on your behalf. ON Thursday night, we had the 1950s Slumber Party in the Crown room, and last night, in addition to the Come as your Favorite Nude Author party, there was the 1920s Speakeasy, and the So Co a Go Go, not to mention the clubbing at the Wet BAR. And today we’ve got a 1960s Hawaiian Lua, the 1970s Disco Blowout, and the grand Times of our Lives Gala.

I wonder how many of you, as you looked over the list of events at Southern Comfort this year, had the same thought that I did, which was to be vaguely reminded of that old Frank Sinatra song, “It was a Very Good Year,” As I’ve been thinking about our many different stories, I’ve thought about the way in which there are different seasons in a transgender person’s life. I’m sorry to tell you that, in fact, I’ve been humming that song, altering the lyrics as I went along. Pretty soon I was singing something like this:

(sings)

When I was seventeen, it was a very good year.
It was a very good year for slipping into my sister’s room
I’d steal a bra from her drawer.
I’d go back to my room and then I’d lock the door,
When I was seventeen.

(okay, and right about here we have a very emotional instrumental break, featuring a big string section. Which then leads us to the second verse)

When I was twenty-five, it was a very good year
It was a very good year for dating girls who look like I do now.
I’d try to act like a guy
When we’d break up they’d look at me and ask why,
When I was twenty five.

(this is the point where we have another even more emotional violin solo. If I had a violin, I would play it for you now.)

When I was forty-one, it was a very good year
It was a very good year for Premarin pills I got from my shrink.
I’d tell my wife, I’m still me,
She’d say , yeah, but you’re a thirty-six C
When I was forty one.

This is the point where we start handing out the hankies. Here comes the waterworks!

I thought I’d share with you all today some of the stories that I’ve found over the course of these good years, as I’ve traveled this long road. Some of these are probably familiar to you, whereas others I know, are just the result of my own particular experience. What they’re not are emblematic stories, any more than I am the emblematic trangendered person. Becauses there is no emblematic transgendered person. Each of us, on the long road, finds something a little different.

But let’s start with this one: when I was twenty-four years old, my girlfriend—the woman I lived with—went out of town for a few days. Well now. What do you think I did in her absence? In those days I lived in new York City, and there was a wig store one block north of the Emprie State Building, on 35th Street. So I walk in there, and this very nice Korean lady says, how can I help you, and I say, I’d like to buy a w—— I’d like to buy a w——
I’m looking all around to see if anybody is going to notice me. I mean, after all, 35th street and 5th avenue, it’s not like it’s a very busy intersection or anything. So finally I point to the wig I want, which was a long and blonde and straight—kind of like the Joni Mitchell effect. Can you imagine that, a grown woman wanting to look like Joni Mitchell, or Laura Dern, or some chick from the seventies. Thank god I grew out of that!

(runs hands through hair.)

Anyway, so I hand over the money, and it was a lot of money, well over a hundred dollars, and then right as she’s ringing it up, there’s this PING from the cash register, and uh oh—she needs to change the tape! So she opens the top of the cash register, and she’s fumbling with the tape, and I just want to say, here, take the money! And run, but she’s working in there, and now she’s calling to the back in Korean and out comes her husband, walking incredibly slowly, like this… and she is shouting, I am trying to sell this man a wig but the tape broke! And he say, you want to sell this guy a wig? This guy? And she says, yes, THIS GUY WANTS TO BUY A WIG. I’m looking out the window at everybody wlaking by on the street, people looking in at me, standing there with the wig, which if I recall correctly had the brand name, CHER, and this very agitated Koren couple, and I can feel the sweat pouring down my temples.

Well finally I get out of there, and I go back to the apartment and I spend exactly 48 hours being a fabulous blonde, looking in the mirror, singing Joni Mitchell songs—Don’t it always seem to go, you don’t know what yo’ve got till it’s gone. Thank you, thank you. I love you all!.

And then, at the end of the day, Joni goes in the trash, and I carry the trash about four blocks down the street, because if anybody, for any reason, goes through the trash and associates it with me, why—the world would come to an end! (dun dun duh duh)

And I realize, as I walk back to the apartment, it isn’t Joni Mitchell songs I ought to have been singing. It’s secret Agent man. There’s a man who lives a life of danger. To everyone he meets he stays a stranger.

Now I ask you, does that sound familiar to you?

OR: how about this one—I’m a little kid, and of course when I was a boy, there was only one thing I wanted for Christmas, which was of course the one thing I was never going to get, because Santa Claus generally doesn’t bring a vagina down the chimney. At least not in the stories I read.
I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid, I hated opening gifts on Christmas, or on my birthday, because I knew that the boxes were never, ever, going to contain the one thing I wanted. Except, on this Christmas, I open up a box, and what’s inside? Panty Hose! I’m thinking, okay! I’m eight years old, and I’ve just gotten a pair of fish nets! I’m looking at my parents, not sure what to say, when my sister, across the room, opens up a box for her, and what’s inside? A baseball glove. Whoa! The worlds gone Topsy turvy! And my parents look at what’s going on, and they come over and switch the presents, and say, oops! What a big mix up! Can you imagine that, our son getting panty hose, and his sister getting a baseball glove! Talk about hilarious! And of course, I have to sit there with the baseball glove in my hand, and I have to look happy about it, and I have to laugh about it, because everyone thinks its very funny, and so I have to act like it’s funny. And all I can do is sit there pretending to laugh, and nodding my head at how funny it all supposedly was. While inside, of course, my heart was breaking.

You ever been in a situation like that?
(improvise here, reaching out to crowd.)

Or how about this: I’m in my late twenties and I have finally fallen in love with an amazing woman named Grace. My whole long life, I have been praying and praying that someone would fall in love with me, because if someone falls in love with me, I will finally get outside of myself, I will finally be cured of this crazy thing I have. And to my amazement, Grace is in love with me. We drove all the way from Louisville Kentucky to Washington DC one day, and we kissed at every stop light on the way. And I feel transformed and healed, and when I get back to my own apartment in Baltimore, I go to the closet and I gather everything up in a big plastic bag. The wigs. The clothes. The bobby pins. The copies of Allure and Vogue and the balloons that I filled with tap water for breast forms and the shoes in size twelve I had to send away for to Lee’s Mardi Gras Boutique, and the heavy pancake makeup and the purple eyeliner and the clip on earrings. And into the trash they went, and I went outside and put the bag by the curb and I stood there beneath the full moon, and I thought, yes, yes, yes, at last I am free! I’ll never need to be a woman again!

Does this sound familiar?

Well, this last story probably won’t sound familiar to most of you, but it happened to me. Fourteen years after I threw that bag of stuff out in the trash, I was waking up in Neenah Wisconsin, with the body I’d always prayed for. In one hand I clasped a little Demerol drip, so that whenever I felt the slightest bit uncomfortable, I went DING, and all my problems went away. I spent a week or two in bed, high as a kite, saying, I’m So Happy! And I’m trying to be entertaining to the people that surrounded me, starting to tell a joke and then falling asleep in the middle of the punchline.

But get this: at my side on that occasion were three people: including Grace, the woman I’d married all those years ago, the woman to whom I’m still married, the woman who at one point said, this is not what I wanted out of a marraiage, I feel totally gypped out of my husband, it’s just not fair, b ut who at another point said, I would never turn my back on the person I love, ever. And so Grace sat by my side and held my hand. And I said to her, Sing me a song?

And she sang me this song:

(singing)

Do you think I could leave you crying?
When there’s room on my horse for two?
Come up here Jack, quit your crying.
We’ll mend up your horse with glue.
When we grow up we’ll be soldiers,
And our horses will not be toys.
Maybe then we’ll remember,
When we were two little boys.

And next to Grace was my friend Rick Russo, a writer from Maine, and my closest friend. And next to Rick, was the cartoonist Timothy Kreider, who, after Grace and Rick headed back to the east coast, hung out with me day after day, watching Buster keaton movies and reading me, from cover to cover, The Princess Bride.

I can tell you that I never had a girlhood. I never had the experience of my father sitting next to me, reading his daughter a good night story. I never had that, and I never will. But when I was forty one, I had Tim Kreider, my dear friend, read me the Princess Bride, chapter after chapter. Hello My name is Inidgo Montoya.
(get crowd to say the next two lines, in unison.) You keel my father. Prepare to die.

Okay. So those are some of my stories. What we need now, in the years to come, are some of yours. Each of us embodies our gender difference in a different way, and what we all need are more stories, more opportunities to learn from each other exactly how many different ways there are to live this life.

We need to hear the story of the genderqueer youth on campuses around the country who are messing with gender every day, who exhibit a courage that I could never have found at their age, who are rejecting the gender binary with bravery, and playfulness, and in your face directness, and with joy.

WE need to hear the story of transmen, and the unique struggles of our brothers, so often forgotten by the media.

We need to hear the story of what happens to transpeople as they get older. We need to hear the stories of the members of our family as we pass through our sixties, and seventies, and eighties.

We need to hear the story of transgender Veterans, who are so often abandoned, or forgotten, even after risking their lives on behalf of their country.

WE need to hear the story of spouses and partners, who suffer just as much as we do, some times, and who, sometimes, help make our lives possible. We need to hear the stories of all of our lovers and partners, who try to be helpful, who try to make sense of something that even we sometimes cannot explain.

WE need to hear the story of some of you in this very room, who are not only here at Southern Comfort for the first time but who are, in fact, out of their own house for the first time, people who this very day have felt the sun on their faces as men, or as women, for the very first time.

I am just enough of an old Deadhead to remember a line that Robert Hunter once wrote,

“Let my inspiration flow in token rhyme, suggesting rhythm,
That will not forsake you, till my tale is told and done.
While the firelights aglow, strange shadows from the flames will grow,
Till things weve never seen will seem familiar.”

I love that idea, of a time coming when things we’ve never seen will seem familiar. But the only way we can achieve this is by seeking our inspiration, that will not forsake us until our tales are told and done.

And if we tell these tales, two things may happen. First of all, all those people out there in the world who right now still don’t get us, who don’t’ understand who we are, or what our problem is—some of those people will start to get it. And so, instead of viewing us like strangers, they will view us as something familiar. And all those tedious shows on TV will stop showing the same story over and over again, and truly start to show the richness of our lives. And instead of talking about jenny Boylan, the transsexual, they might say, oh, there’s jenny Boylan, the English teacher. She’s a parent like me, or a teacher, like me, or I don’t know. Someone who seems like a person you might actually know.

If, we all find the courage to tell our stories, the other thing that may happen is this. That when young transgender people start to try to figure out who they are and what they are, that instead of thinking that they have to live up to somebody else’s story, they can, instead, live out their own. Instead of wanting to be the next Christine Jorgensen, or Ru Paul, or Leslie Feinberg, or god help us, Jenny Boylan—they will, instead, choose to be themselves.

That Frank Sinatra song ends like this:

(sings)

But now the days grow short
We’re in the autumn of the year
And now I think of my lives as vintage wine
from fine old kegs
from the brim to the dregs
It pours sweet and clear

It was a very good year.

In that spirit, I want to wish you all a great day, a wonderful weekend, and many, many, many good years, of telling your stories.

Thanks everybody.

I recently talked with a crossdresser who’s extremely convincing—from her photos you’d think she was born female and she’s won two national female impersonation titles—and even she gets read sometimes. But she said part of her enjoys the attention (including when she gets read), and I’d have to agree. I think for many of us the motivations to dress include a bit of (healthy) exhibitionism. Not the flasher-in-raincoat kind of exhibitionism, but rather the desire to look good and show off the way women are allowed to in a way that is not nearly acceptable for men. (Of course feeling like you have to be on display isn’t fun, but we’re talking about grass-is-greener desires here.)

Interestingly, a female friend commented that I’ve been trying too hard to blend in, and I well, blended in. She thought there was a bit I could do to look glamourous—but that looking that way would draw attention and was I ready for that. It was a good question. As a crossdresser attention is a two-edged sword. Am I getting attention because I’m
beautiful or because I’m being read—or both.

On one of my mailing lists someone asked whether going out en femme and not trying to pass is a sign of total acceptance of transgender expression, or just poor skills in transformation, or possibly a mild antisocial behavior.

It can be any or all or the above. There was a famous rich “character” named Neil Cargile who started cross-dressing (and was profiled in the New Yorker). He looked slapped together and there was absolutely no chance he’d be mistaken for anything but a guy in dress. OTOH, I wonder if he wasn’t a crossdresser, but rather just doing it for the
attention (he’d been an attention getter most of his life). OTOH, deliberately being sloppy could be a way of disguising that he really was experiencing transgendered feelings. We’ll probably never know.

On another list, someone else had some good definitions: “Passing” is the ability to present oneself as the gender they are portraying. “Minimal passing” is being recognized as the gender one is portraying in a public environment. “Ultimate passing” is being recognized as the gender one is portraying in a conversational environment. “Fantasy passing” is being accepted as the gender one is portraying among teenagers at all times.

What she calls “minimal passing” I think of as “blending in,” which is something I try for. I’d prefer to be seen as just another woman. (If society were a bit more accepting and I were a bit braver, I’d also like to do the Eddie Izzard-gender bending look some of the time, but that’s another story.) But realistically I’m going to be read some of the
time, which is why my other goal is being “presentable.” If you’re read and you act like you deserve respect, my experience is that you’ll usually get it.

In “My Husband Betty” Helen Boyd makes an asute observation that cross-dressers often are envious of things genetic women take for granted: “They envy the easy friendship between women, the casual way women touch each other when they talk. Imagine a man gently brushing another man’s hair out of his eyes while they’re chatting! But women do that kind of thing all the time, even ones who aren’t especially feminine.”

I’ve always envied the way one my best friends can easily strike up a conversation with another woman she’s just met. Obviously, this isn’t dependent on gender. My friend is gregarious while I’ve always been social awkward around strangers. (Yes, despite being raised in California, I’m one of Garrison Keillor’s people.) But it does seem like there’s a big difference to the way two newly-introduced women interact compared to two guys.

The reverse is also true. I know many genetic women who envy men’s freedom to move in safety—something I didn’t truly understand until going out en femme.

Maybe this is one reason it’s difficult for women to understand why we do it. Partly, I think we’re not always able to clearly articulate some of these things precisely because they’re so “ordinary.” Partly, it’s when we do, women have a hard time seeing why these sorts of things might be special to us—I’ve often heard genetic women express puzzlement about our attraction to make-up. Of course, there’s also a big difference wanting to do something—like wearing skirts or make-up—and feeling obligated to do it.

Of course, like any other “grass is greener” feeling, it’s envying something that sometimes is illusionary, in part or in whole. My friend can be far cattier about other women—including those she just chatted merrily away with—than I would ever be. Likewise as any guy knows, thugs and bullies will happily beat up on a “weak” guy. And if they really want to prove they’re tough, they’ll start a fight with the biggest, baddest dude around. Transman Raven Kaldera relates how a fellow transman learned this the hard way. As a butch lesbian, she could get in guys’ faces and they’d back off because she was a woman. As a man she got decked immediately.

BTW, I intentionally used the word “envy,” which is a complex emotion. It’s both a grudging admiration and a painful desire for another’s advantages mixed with a simultaneous discontent and resentment at their advantages. In relationships it often involves love/hate. Love for your partner and hate for the power they have over you.

Years ago Nancy Friday wrote in her book “Jealousy” (which really focuses on envy and power relationships): “Today, many women don’t need men, either for their money or for their sperm, given society’s tolerance of women having children on their own. Men’s envy of our new found power may lessen as they get into women’s traditional areas of strength, namely beauty and the rearing of the children, but it hasn’t happened yet….We don’t yet have that new social structure. Returning to Patriarchy is out of the question, but as a new power structure emerges to replace it, we must understand more than ever the furies our dismantling of Patriarchy have released. Our fury at powerlessness—our envy—is stronger than ever, stronger than any feelings of love. The truth is that we cannot love until we understand envy and its relationship to jealousy.”

In that light, we crossdressers are at least open about our envies while in other men it often festers beneath the surface unacknowledged, even to themselves. We take those things we envy and make them our own—at least sort of our own, since we’re doing them en femme rather than en homme.

Sometimes it’s not pretty. As Kaldera says:

Sometimes when you drag out an opposite-sex persona – so to speak – you find that it’s been stashed in the same mental closet as all the things that you don’t like about the opposite gender, and they’ve become stuck all over it like barnacles, or growths. They won’t flake off until that persona has been exposed to the air for a while, and gotten a chance to rub up against real people and real circumstances. This may mean plowing through years of humiliating stereotypical behavior until that part of you evolves and grows into a fuller human being. I’ve seen it again and again, especially in people who are just starting to cross-dress or whose CD persona only gets out once in a while. Stereotypes abound: the trashy whore, the catty and manipulative upper-class bitch, the irresponsible little girl, the supported housewife who never has to work or deal with the outside world, the delicately passive – and utterly useless – ornament, and, of course, Mom. In the bedroom, the sexual stereotypes can be even more cartoon-like, from Sweet Gwen the Victim to the Dragon Lady, but is most commonly the passive, receptive do-me-queen that men don’t usually get to be. Sometimes their personas are clearly signposts pointing to the issues that they are bravely working through.

Women are often horrified and offended when men deliberately imitate women, whether it’s a female impersonator in a drag performance or a fetishistic cross-dresser in ratty nylons and a bad wig. They feel that these performances of female gender are a bad caricature, and don’t actually resemble the real experience of women. While it’s true that a performance, or even a persona, is by definition shallower than a person, there’s still a grain (or a sackful) of truth to these performances. For every one of these stereotypes being performed by men, I’ve met the same ones being performed by women, and in larger numbers. I’ve met the biologically female version of every one of these caricatures, and I’m sure that the women who complain about the guys in dresses probably have, too.

The one silver lining of envy is that by pointing out where we feel inadequate we can choose to address those perceived inadequacies. Instead of coveting the characteristics we wish we had, we can develop them for ourselves. Likewise, we can move from begrudged admiration to respectful appreciation when we see those qualities in others.