I Go

Following up on Paula’s post about where to go out en femme and my post about encountering men when out, here is a post about traveling hither and yon in a motor vehicle en femme. 

I have driven my Subaru thousands of miles cross-country cross-dressed and my experiences as a woman driver were revealing to me.

🚘 Warning: If you are concerned about outing yourself, driving your vehicle might give you away. 

I live on a dead end off another dead end and having owned the same car for a long time, my neighbors know what I drive and on occasion, while exiting the neighborhood en femme, I have crossed paths with neighbors working in their yard or driving their vehicles in the opposite direction. I don’t know if they realized who was driving my car – no one ever mentioned seeing me en femme in my car. And even if they did, I am so out, it would not bother me, but if you are not so out, exiting your neighborhood en femme is something to consider.

Beyond your neighborhood, you might think that you are safe, but I always remember driving on I-90 in Boston, 125 miles from home, when a car passed me by blowing its horn and seeing my cousin waving as he passed by. (I was en homme at the time.) 

To add to the potential of being recognized, I have my ham radio call sign on my license plate. So if you have vanity license plates, that may be a giveaway as to who’s that girl driving your car. 

🚘 If I wear shorts or a short skirt or dress when I drive, tractor trailer drivers will occasionally honk in appreciation of the view. Even though I am an old lady, I have had this experience more than once.

🚘 No surprise here, but male drivers will take advantage of woman drivers. Men drive more aggressively when they cross paths with me. They assume that I will back off and give them the right of way, which I usually do, not because I am meek and mild, but because I am crossdressed. I do not want to get into an accident, then have to deal with civilians and police as an outed crossdresser, which showing my driver’s license will clearly reveal.

🚘 Following up on the previous point, I drive legal as a woman driver. I closely follow all the rules of the road because I don’t want to deal with police as a crossdresser. In my neck of the woods, dealing with the police is not an issue because they have been trained to deal respectfully with our kind. Beyond my neck of the woods, who knows? In any case, who wants to deal with the police respectfully or not?

🚘 Car trouble as a woman driver is a piece of cake. You won’t break a nail or get a smudge of car grease on your skirt fixing the problem. Being an AAA member is one solution, but instead of waiting for AAA to show up, just look helpless and soon a gentleman will stop by and do the dirty work. 

Once while shopping at a strip mall, I returned to my car with my purchases and my car would not start, so I opened the hood to see if that would help. It did! Within minutes, two gents in a pickup truck pulled up, assessed the situation and determined that my battery was dead. They carefully explained to me how to start the car by popping the clutch and I was quickly on my way.

🚘 Passing is easy as a woman driver. Just use your turn signal to indicate what you are doing and when the passing lane is clear, speed up to enter the passing lane. After you passed, use your turn signal again and return to the travel lane. 

Seriously, passing as a woman is easier sitting inside your car. Tinted glass and reflections off the glass camouflage your appearance so you are less likely to be read sitting in your vehicle. Waiting at a traffic light one night, a guy in the lane next to me rolled down the window on the passenger side of his car and tried earnestly to engage me in conversation. I ignored him, but I assumed that I passed especially since it was dark.

🚘 Roadtrips require stops for gas, food and overnight stays. Dealing with civilians who sell gas, food and overnight accommodations is no worse than dealing with the sales rep at your favorite boutique; they want your money, so they will treat you nicely in order to collect it. I have never had a problem – even those times when I checked into a hotel en homme and checked out en femme (or vice versa). No one batted an eye.

🚘 During long roadtrips, you are likely to need to use a restroom. I have no fear about using the ladies’ room in Connecticut because the state laws protect me, but I feel less comfortable using the ladies’ rooms in other states because their state laws may not protect me. However, I will feel even more uncomfortable if I don’t use the ladies’ room, so I do what I have to do and have never had a problem. 

For what it’s worth, I have successfully relieved myself in ladies’ rooms in the following states: Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Rhode Island and West Virginia.

And so I go.

Wearing Louisa Ballou

Scott Townsend femulating in the television movie Thirsty.