Crossdresser or Pretty-Dresser?

Transistor Dept.

I know some of you are radio-inclined, so if you are attending Hamvention next week, I'd love to see you in person. I will be staffing TAPR's booths in Building 5 of the Greene County Fairgrounds and attending the annual TAPR-AMSAT banquet Friday evening. CUL

Time Magazine, August 19, 2039
(Source: the extraordinary gender role reversal
art of Jamie Vesta)

Puppy Dog Tails Dept.

I had a revelation last night when I was reading your comments to yesterday's post (If sugar and spice and everything nice was a boy thing).

Stephanie asked, if we lived in a world where males dressed like females and females dressed like males, would I (a cisgender male) "still desire to wear the clothing of the opposite sex like I do in the real world I exist in now?"

This may start a firestorm, but here is what I thought.

If you answer "yes," then you are a male-to-female transexual. You are really a woman and you crossdress to present as your true gender. The clothes are not important; gender is what matters to you.

If you answer "no," then you are not a transexual. You are really a "pretty-dresser," that is, you like to dress pretty and in order to fit in, you may even speak and act like the gender that "normally" dresses pretty. The clothes and all the trappings of the pretty-dressing is what matters to you.

And so it goes.

Wearing Boston Proper (Source: Boston Proper)

George Jetson lives a femulator's dream when he becomes Georgina Jetstream, lands a job as a secretary and goes out on a date with the boss.

If sugar and spice and everything nice was a boy thing

Stephanie Sometimes wrote, "Some time ago you posted a movie trailer for a Swedish film called Girls & Boys. The premise was that girls wore jeans, tees and Keds while the boys wore skirts, dresses, heels, hose and makeup like the boys in the photo from the film (above).

"My question is if I was living in that reality being a guy in silk satin and lace, would I still desire to wear the clothing of the opposite sex like I do in the real world I exist in now. I wonder if your followers have opinions on this subject.

"I know I would be in heaven to live in that alternative reality, but would my desire to be the opposite sex drive me into the drab 'boy' clothes that the girls wear in the film?"

Comments, opinions, what say Femulate readers?

Wearing Bebe (Source: Bebe)

Janek Traczy femulates Lana Del Rey on Polish television's Your Face Sounds Familiar (2018) 

Your Turn

Any suggestions?

I like writing this blog and I assume people like reading it with nearly 14 million hamburgers sold.

Can I do better?

Is there anything I can do here that would increase the value of reading this blog for you?

I am always open to your suggestions, so please leave comments below or, if you prefer, e-mail me by clicking here.

I look forward to reading and implementing your suggestions, so have at it!

Wearing Veronica Beard (Source: Veronica Beard)

Eddie, a man in drag poses for a close up wearing a pearl necklace and styled hair, circa 1925. (Source: Digital Transgender Archive)

Overpacking

I always overpack.

It has not been an issue so far because airlines have not been involved in my travels, but multi-day trips involve packing my Subaru to the brim.

I took eight pieces of luggage to Provincetown for my first trip to Fantasia Fair for an eight-day stay.

My Hamvention trips usually involve four or five pieces of luggage for a four-day stay.

The only time I economized was for my four-day trip to New York City. I only had three pieces of luggage because I was traveling by train.

I always bring stuff that I never use: extra dresses, extra hosiery, extra bras, extra panties, extra shoes, extra nails, extra jewelry, extra etcetera.

Usually, I plan ahead with a spreadsheet and know what I am going to wear for each day of my trip, but I still overpack. One piece of luggage that I know I should leave home is my makeup box. It is a large tackle box that I bought at Walmart that is chock full of makeup. Who needs 30 shades of lipstick for a four-day trip

One time when I was moving my luggage into my hotel room. I was in boy mode carrying my makeup/tackle box and as I passed two guys in the hall, one said to the other, "He's going fishing!"

A week from now, I will be packing for my four-day stay in Ohio to attend Hamvention. I hope I can do it with three pieces of luggage. I'll let you know how I do.

Wearing JustFab (Source: JustFab)

The cast of the Polish production of Casa Valentina.

Get Femulate by E-Mail

Ten days ago, I wrote here that you can receive Femulate by e-mail by clicking on the Get Femulate by E-Mail link at the top of the right-hand column.

I received a pertinent comment that I want to pass on to readers attempting to subscribe: If you don't see the subscription request confirmation in your e-mail Inbox, look for it in your Spam folder.

Keep on High Heelin’

In my youth, I felt that I was not dressed unless I was wearing high heels. I wore high heels as often as possible and the higher the better.

I was following my mother's lead (like mother, like son) ― she always wore heels. So as her female son/male daughter, I always wore high heels, too.

In my maturity, I know about the pitfalls of wearing high heels and I know that wearing high heels does not define you as a woman. Most women my age know better and shun heels, yet they are still women

Nevertheless, I still like to wear high heels and I usually do. Recalling that AARP commercial about a woman of a certain age who knows her way around miniskirts and can run in high heels always inspires me to keep on high heelin'.

But since my feet are not as pliable as they used to be, I have to search out the most comfortable heels if I plan to wear them for more than a few hours as a time. (Who What Wear has some good tips regarding "How to Stand in Heels for 8 Hours Without Killing Your Feet.")

I hope to be able to continue to wear high heels for a long time. I know I will try hard to do so. And maybe someday they'll say, "She died with her stilettos on."

Note 1: This post is an edited rerun of a post from 2015. 

Note 2: The accompanying photo is significant to me personally because the framed photo on the wall behind me is a photo of my mother.

All shapes and sizes (Source: JustFab)

All shapes and sizes (Source: Le Femme Finishing School)

Someday Funnies

"Imitate young girls" is the English translation of the caption of this 1930's comic postcard from France. A joke about gender stereotyping, the ironic message seems to be 'Boys, you're never too young to start wearing perfume and make-up.'

Wearing Zuhair Murad (Source: Zuhair Murad)

Before and after selfies

Act Naturally

Whenever I recount my biography (like at outreach), I usually mention that as a youngster, I participated in sports (baseball and football) and played "boy games" (cowboys, war, spacemen, etc.). I felt that I was a typical boy and I enjoyed doing "boy things," unlike many of my trans sisters, who as children, hated "boy things" and preferred "girl things."

I also mention in my bio that despite my participation and enjoyment of those boy things, other boys called me names like "sissy," "fairy," "faggot," etc., which indicated to me that I was not necessarily all the boy I thought I was.

This was not just a case of bullies using random offensive names to raise my ire. Even a few of my friends told me that I was not acting like a boy at a 100% level and that I should do something about it.

I wondered if there was something in my mannerisms or speech that caused their reaction? I was not intentionally acting or speaking in an affected manner. Rather, I was speaking and acting in my natural manner, which I did not feel was feminine.

The fact that even friends told me that something was amiss indicated that something really was amiss, but I was clueless. I had no idea what I had to do differently to be more boy-like. So, I continued acting the same way I always acted and if someone called me a name, I hit them with my purse.

Even in high school, college, and law school, I occasionally ran into guys, who commented on my particular flavor of masculinity, but I just shrugged them off and kept on truckin'. By then, I was crossdressing in secret and only coming out en femme for Halloween including an appearance en femme at a Halloween party in law school.

I will never forget a friend of mine at that party telling me that he never realized how feminine my speaking and mannerisms were until he saw me dressed as a woman. He indicated that my female costume was a perfect fit for my normal mannerisms and speech.

After mentioning this story at outreach one time, one of the students confirmed that my mannerisms were feminine and that my friends and acquaintances had been in the ballpark in their estimation of me.

Yet, nothing has changed. I still do not affect a feminine persona. I still act naturally and no differently whether in boy mode or girl mode.

I admit that I do try to walk more like a woman when I am en femme and I talk more softly when I femulate, but most of what you get is the genuine me. And I am not changing a thing.

Wearing Metrostyle (Source: Metrostyle)

Professional femulator Willie Manders poses for this postcard from the 1920's.

She comes on like a rose

What turned out to be a free recall of my Subaru to replace an airbag turned into an $850 bill!

I took the Subaru to my dealer Tuesday morning for the recall and an oil change and drove home in a loaner, a brand new Subaru Outback.

Later that afternoon, I got the call telling me that my car needed assorted work including a rear brake job. At first I balked at the potential $850 bill, but then I reconsidered since I have driven the car for over a year without any trouble nor maintenance. Also, I am facing a roadtrip to Ohio in two weeks, so I agreed to the work that was suggested.

Meanwhile, I literally drained the swamp on Friday. The west side of my property has a number of springs and the water runs downhill into a culvert that dumps it into a nearby brook. The primary path for the water was clogged with leaves and other debris, so instead of flowing away, a swamp was in the making. So I spent about an hour clearing the path and draining the swamp.

No good deed goes unpunished and I woke up Sunday morning to find my hands and arms blossoming with poison ivy. I applied apple cider vinegar to effectively stop the itching, but it did nothing for the spreading rash. So after I picked up my car at the Subaru dealer yesterday, I drove to the local hospital's walk-in clinic to deal with the poison ivy.

A PA confirmed that I had poison ivy and she prescribed Prednizone and Benadryl. I picked up the meds at my pharmacy, drove home and popped the pills.

About an hour later, I was on my way to Aldi and Stop & Shop to do the weekly grocery shopping, when the Bendryl kicked in and I started feeling very sleepy. As a result, what is normally a 90-minute grocery run took 2-1/2 hours because I was so out of it. Upon returning home, I unloaded the groceries and crashed.

Around 9:30 PM, I decided to turn in. Before going to bed, I went into the room where my radio shack is located to make sure everything was powered down. I could not resist listening to the radio before going to bed and as luck would have, radio conditions were very good (I could hear WJCC on 1700 kHz, which is located in Miami Springs, F-L-A, 1666 miles away!), but I was so exhausted that I shut down the shack and went to bed.

(Source: Bluefly)

Alex Newell

Overdressing

I am an overdresser.

There ― I admitted it. I got it off my chest and now I don't have to worry about people accusing me of being an "overdresser" because I have come out to the world about it.

It is hard to overdress when you attend a trans support group meeting; many of the attendees overdress because the meeting may be their only opportunity to dress at all, so they dress to kill.

That being said, when I attended trans support group meetings, I was usually the most overdressed girl at the meeting. Hands down. No question about it.

I carried on my overdressing when I began going out in public en femme. The woman in a cocktail dress and high heels shopping at Wal*Mart ― that was me. The woman in the sequin evening gown seated in the centerfield bleachers at Fenway Park ― that was me. The woman in the little black dress and pearls dining at Taco Bell ― you guessed it ― that was me, too.

At first, I worried about it because overdressing drew attention to me and by drawing attention to me, civilians might scrutinize me too closely and figure out that I was packing something extra underneath my periwinkle bridesmaid gown.

I sure did not want to out myself, so I began toning it down. But I soon found out that toned-down dressing was Boring with a capital B!

Blending in with all the other babes at Home Depot was just not my thing. I wanted to be outstanding in my field in heels, not flats.

So, I began overdressing again and I have never looked back because in the words of blogger Kate Fridkis, "Being overdressed is fun. You have to pull it off with confidence. You have to walk with your shoulders back, like you planned it. Like you're dressed up because you live a dramatic, impressive life. I mean, why not? Maybe you do."

Ms. Fridkis' "The Art of Overdressing" on The Huffington Post inspired this post and I urge you to go read it yourself; maybe it will inspire you to buy a red strapless dress to wear to the grocery store.

Wearing JustFab (Source: JustFab)

Austrian actors Oscar Sabo and Josefine Dora switched genders 100 years ago

A Fan Letter

Paul goes by the name of Paula and sends me infrequent fan letters. His/her most recent missive follows.

I am aware as much as anyone the nature of the fantasyland that crossdressers inhabit but one thing has always bewildered me; EVERY story of 'passing' involves women, never men. I gave up believing these stories years ago particularly when they included a picture which nearly always demonstrate that the ability to 'pass' is extremely limited. One has to accept that 'Fictionmania' is not the only place for fantasy. Can you recommend a supplier of these mirrors which enable one to believe that this so often unattractive male is is transmuted into a beautiful sexy woman. There must be one hell of a lot sold judging by the pictures you post.

I have other "fans" who send similar letters and comments. They claim to be femulators and are very judgmental of their femulating sisters.

Early on, these writers bothered me with their vitriol, but then it occurred to me that they were probably just jealous. When they compare the image of the man in a dress that they see in their mirror with what they see in this blog, their jealousy turns to rage and it ends up in my in-box.

And so it goes.

By the way, Paula, I have had many passing encounters with males. They clearly treated me as a woman by calling me "Ma'am" or "Miss," holding doors open for me, flirting with me and even propositioning me. They have also spoken to me in a condescending or oversimplified fashion (as if was a bimbo) and called me a "dyke," "lipstick lesbian" and "Amazon," which are affirming in a negative sort of way.

And so it goes again.        

Wearing Moda Operandi (Source: Moda Operandi)

Nastja Sherer and friend (Source: flickr)

Someday Funnies

Wearing Paige (Source: Paige)

Michael femulates Michelle. Read all about it here. (Thank you Leon for this femulation)

No Show

I am very sorry and very disappointed, but I will not be able to present and attend the Transgender Lives Conference on Saturday. It is due to a personal family matter that I cannot work around. I was hoping to work it out in time to attend the Conference, but it was not meant to be.

Again, I am very sorry, but this bump in the road was unavoidable.