Reviewing the New Payless

If you have been following along here for awhile, you know that I was a big fan of Payless shoes. (Last count, I own 47 pairs.) So it was no surprise that I was sad when they went out of business last year.

But, earlier this year, Payless announced that they were back in business and during the summer, they launched a new website. 

I was curious about the new Payless and wondered how it compared to the old. So I perused their website frequently, but did not find anything I needed until last week, when I saw a pair of heels that I just had to have – royal blue patent pumps. 

I ordered my size and the $29.99 shoe only cost $20.99 with their 12 days of Christmas discount. Shipping was free and I received my order three days later via UPS.

When my ordered arrived, I opened the package as quick as a Playboy bunny and noted the quality of my purchase. Belying their price, the shoes were not cheap – they are a good quality shoe, as good if not better than the old Payless products.

The proof is in the footing, so I slipped on a pair of knee highs, slipped on my new shoes and tried them on for about four hours. They were very comfortable throughout the tryout and I had no problem maneuvering in their three-inch heel. 

Overall, I am very pleased with my first purchase from the new Payless.

Their website needs a little work, though. They show the colors of the shoes you can purchase, but don't name the colors. Just showing pictures of the available colors does not suffice; they need to add the names of the colors, too.

Also, I believe there is an error in the description of their Fioni pumps. No way do they have 2-inch kitten heels. They look more like 4-inch stiletto heels.

Wearing Rotate

Another one of the “Millions” on the Internet

Someday Funnies

Wearing New York & Company

Billy House femulated in the 1937 film Merry-Go-Round of 1938.
Thank-you Chrissy for the femulation in this film, which you can view on YouTube.

Millions

Search for crossdressers on Pinterest, Reddit, TikTok, flickr, Instagram, YouTube, etc. and you will be inundated with images and videos of girls like us – thousands, if not millions of them! Young girls, middle-aged women and senior ladies – we come in all shapes, sizes and ages and our online community is growing larger everyday. 

There is a little girl in every boy and until recently, that girl was locked away, never to see the light of day. Now femulating no longer has the stigma it had in the past. And encouraged by femulating peers, more and more boys are letting their girl out. 

Girls are coming out of the closet by posting their images online. Some stray further out of the closet posting images of them out among the civilians. 

Going out among the civilians acclimates society to what we do. Seeing a femulator out and about is no longer the rarity it was 10 or 20 years ago and such sightings encourage civilians, who may have an itch to femulate, to try it themselves.

Girls just want to have fun and once a boy discovers how much fun it is to be a girl, it is harder and harder to put their girl back in the closet after tasting her lipstick.

For years, females have had the freedom to be as boyish as they desire. I believe that society has reached a point where males now have the freedom to be as girlish as they desire. Many boys don't realize it yet, but as they become more aware, girls like us will be everywhere.  

Wearing Rachel Zoe

One of the “Millions” on the Internet

Throwback Thursday: My Quest

Another post from the past – nearly nine years ago, December 14, 2011.

In 1983, I purged everything related to femulating.

Not only did I discard replaceable items like clothing, wigs, makeup, etc., I also discarded irreplaceable items, primarily my collection of photographs. As a result, I no longer own a single photo of myself en femme prior to age 32.

Starla has been scouring the Internet searching online high school yearbooks for photos of high school femulations. She has sent me her findings and I have posted some of them here in the past.

Last week, it occurred to me that there were yearbook photos of me en femme (at the ripe old age of 25) attending my law school’s Halloween party. I lost the yearbook (it went out with everything else in the great purge of 1983), but I wondered if Starla could find it online.

I asked her, but after searching her resources, she responded that she could not find it. She explained that the majority of online yearbooks are of the high school variety; only a few college and graduate school yearbooks are online. She suggested contacting my law school.

I phoned the law school library and asked if they had the yearbook in their stacks. They checked and as it turned out, they had it! They welcomed me to visit the library to view it and photocopy anything I wanted.

Wednesday, I dressed en femme. I wore my black dress with the sequins pattern at the neckline that I bought from Ideeli, nude pantyhose, my new Nine West patent red and black Mary Janes, a new matching red bag from ShoeDazzle, earrings, bracelet, and watch. I topped everything off with my white fake fur coat and was off to Springfield to visit my alma mater.

(I might mention here that although I graduated from law school, I never practiced in the profession – not for one second. My first love was writing and while I waited for the results of the bar exam, I got a job as a writer and never looked back.)

An hour later, I arrived at the law school, parked the Subaru and walked to the school entrance.

There was a security guard station at the entrance. The library is not open to the general public; only students, alumni, faculty, and attorneys can gain admittance. I explained to the guard that I was an alumnus and she asked me for a photo ID. As I extracted my driver’s license from my purse, I told the guard that I was trans and that I looked a little different than the photo on the ID.

She said, “You're not the first.”

After she logged me in, I walked down the hall to the library. It was deserted. Final exams were underway and I assumed most of the students were in the classrooms filling up blue books. (Do they still use blue books?)

The library staff had set the yearbook aside for me, so they did not have to search the stacks again. I just had to fill out a simple form to borrow the book.

I found a comfy chair in the library lounge to cuddle up with the book and recall the past. I was sure that there were two candid photos of me attending that Halloween party 35 years ago en femme and I was a correct.

I wish I had my computer scanner to copy the photos, but all I had access to was a copying machine. I did my best adjusting the darkness to capture the best image and the result accompanies this post.

By the way, you find me in the photos wearing my first wig (purchased at a local Frederick’s of Hollywood store), my mother’s skirt (that I borrowed surreptitiously), my own boy mode sweater, a blouse of unknown origin and my first pair of Mary Janes.

And I was so young – so young that it brings tears to my eyes!

My Wednesday en femme did not end at the copying machine in my alma mater's law library.

As I exited the law school, I asked the security guard, who had been very personable so far, if she would take my photo. She was happy to do so and was even willing to go outdoors to take it.

It was a beautiful December day, so we decided to do the photoshoot outdoors. The photo accompanying this post is from that shoot.

I thanked her for her hospitality and left the school. I drove home and my day en femme was over.

All the people (male and female) who I encountered were polite, often friendly and always helpful when I needed their assistance. I don’t know if I passed or not and whether passing had anything to do with their reaction to me.

I have reached a stage in my life in which passing is not a deal breaker.

When I prepare to go out, I do my best to be passable. I try to be impeccable in my dress and makeup and make sure that there is not a hair out of place, but once I am out the door, I stop being concerned about passing.

I used to be very shy when I was en femme fearing that everyone I encountered would read me. If they seemed ok with me, then I would open up and be more like myself, but if they were not ok with me, I would get out of Dodge as quickly as possible

Now, I am personable to everyone I encounter. I don't wait to see how they react to me. I believe that by being personable and outgoing, it surprises people and they react positively whether they read me or not.

And I don't even think about it. That's the way I am in boy mode and now that I am free of the shackles of passing, I can also be myself in girl mode.

Wearing New York & Company

A Liverpool lad femulating in a 2018 stage production of Bugsy Malone

A CD B&B

Casa Susanna was basically a bed and breakfast for crossdressers located in the Catskills of New York State during the 1960s.

It was operated by a husband and wife, he, a crossdresser named Susanna and she, a famed wig maker from New York City named Marie. Before Casa Susanna, they ran a similar establishment, the Chevalier D’Eon Resort, which was also in the Catskills.

Chevalier D’Eon Resort was the site of the adventures of Darrell Raynor, as documented in his 1968 book A Year Among the Girls.

Raynor’s book was the first book I ever encountered on the subject of crossdressing. At the time, I was a teenager and it took three trips to the store before I got up the nerve to buy the book. I will never forget the smirk on the face of the saleswoman, who rang up my purchase. I wanted to hide under a rock, but instead I took the book home and read it from cover-to-cover that night.

The book was such an eye-opener for a young femulator like me. Back then, there was next to no information available on the subject unless you frequented the right (wrong) bookstores or received mail wrapped in plain brown paper. So, I was amazed that there were adults dressing up and socializing as women!

Raynor never mentioned the name of the CD B&B he wrote about, nor did he mention exactly where it was located, but he gave a few clues and my guess was that it was located in the Poconos of Pennsylvania. I was very surprised to learn decades later that the CD B&B was just a short trek across the state line smack dab in an area where I worked for a six-week stint way back when.

During my six-week stay in Upstate New York, I visited the local lingerie shop and was fitted for a classic all-in-one by the older woman who ran the shop and knew her business. After the fitting, she was proud of her handiwork and commented that I had a great figure.

I was running a one-person quick-print shop and next door was a dress shop also run by an older woman. After six weeks, we became friendly, but I did not take advantage of our friendship and ask to try on her wares because I was worried that the guy I worked for might find out.

But I digress.

I filed Raynor's CD B&B in the back of mind. It came back to mind in 2005, when the book titled Casa Susanna came to be.

According to Amazon, “...while at a New York flea market, inveterate collectors Michael Hurst and Robert Swope discovered a large body of snapshots: album after aged album of well-preserved images, taken roughly between the mid-50s and mid-60s, depicting a group of cross-dressers united around a place called Casa Susanna, a rather large and charmingly banal Victorian-style house in small-town New Jersey [sic]. The inhabitants, visitors, guests, and hosts used it as a weekend headquarters for a regular girl’s life.' Someone—probably ‘Susanna or the matriarch—nailed a wonder board on a tree proclaiming it ‘Casa Susanna,’ and thus a Queendom was born.

“Through these wonderfully intimate shots—perhaps never intended to see the light of day outside the sanctum of the 'house'—Susanna and her gorgeous friends styled era-specific fashion shows and dress-up Christmas and tea parties. As gloriously primped as these documentary snaps are, it is in the more private and intimate life at Casa Susanna, where the girls sweep the front porch, cook, knit, play Scrabble, relax at the nearby lake and, of course, dress for the occasion, that the stunning insight to a very private club becomes nothing less than brilliant and awe inspiring in its pre-glam, pre-drag-pose ordinariness and nascent preening and posturing in new identities. It is not glamour for the stage but for each other, like other women who dress up to spend time with friends, flaunting their own sense of style. There is an evident pleasure of being here, at Casa Susanna, that is a liberation, a simplification of the conflicts inherent in a double life.”

For more information about Casa Susanna, I invite you to read Zagria's blog post on the topic.

Wearing Ann Taylor

William Belli femulating in the television movie A Beauty & The Beast Christmas
Thank-you Velma for the information about this femulation

The Civilian Service

By Gina V

I worked in an administrative division of the British public sector in the 80s and 90s, where I witnessed it turn from a dull but steady and reliable form of employment (where one retired on a decent pension) into a Thatcher-instigated all-singing all-dancing ballyhoo. This essentially meant engaging several extra layers of overpaid fifth-rate private sector management to replace the faithful but plodding civil service administrators in order to (fail to) improve the lot of the great British public. And waste a hell of a lot more of the taxpayers’ hard-earned money in the process. 

Just in case you haven’t already got the picture, I was not too impressed with the overhaul, nor with most of my new colleagues in particular the financial overlord hired to enforce the brave new world. Despite his superficially-friendly manner, anyone with half a brain could see what laid beneath was pure shark. So it was no surprise to me when he made it clear that no one had a job for life anymore and it was now basically each man for himself in what had become a deadly game of survival. 

As such, it came as rather a shock to turn up at the works Christmas party to find the guy prancing around in full drag. Not fancy dress drag (it wasn't that sort of event), but in mini-skirt, wig, etc. If he had been beloved and respected by his staff, I could have understood it. Instead, most, if not all feared and despised him, which made his motives questionable, if not alarming. Of course, afterwards he claimed he had only done it “for a laugh.” 

However, a short time later he invited his mostly brown-nosing managerial subordinates to join him for a birthday celebration in the West End. Not at any old venue though, but one that happened to be a drag cabaret club. So I went along, even though I couldn’t stand the guy purely as a convenient excuse as a then-closet crossdresser to see the show. 

By then, I had become the voice in the wilderness in a world of utter insanity, where public money was being thrown about like confetti while staff were too anxious about losing their jobs to do them effectively. So perhaps unsurprisingly, when the axe started falling, I found myself being one of the first in line. But to use Stana's terminology, I more than suspected my executioner was not the “civilian” he made himself out to be (as the old saying goes “it takes one to know one”). Had I come out to him as such, we probably would have found we had at least one thing in common that we didn’t before. And who knows, maybe I might even have been spared the axe.

Not that my morality would have let me continue on that basis as it would have been a case of “jobs for the boys” (or for “the girls” in this instance). But all the same, I was angry at having to clear my desk at the time, as I had put in over a decade of service beyond the call of duty (if I had a pound every time I stayed late or even went in at weekends on my own time...). And to add insult to injury, I was only offered a paltry three-months salary as a redundancy payoff. All that, simply because I was “the boy” in The Emperor’s New Clothes!

However, I realized in retrospect that in the long term the guy had done me a favor for I decided to drop out of the rat race as a result of it (and now being clear that despite my best efforts, I was patently not cut out for it). That in turn strengthened my resolve to emerge from the closet and as such, probably did so far earlier than I might have otherwise.

Wearing Mackage

Dorian Wayne femulating in the 1971 film The Blue Sextet.
You can view the femulation on YouTube.

Someday Funnies

Wearing Boston Proper

Professional femulators on a 2020 episode of television's Station 19
Thank you Velma for the information about this femulation.

Saving Lives by Busting Gender Norms

By Chris Dorso

I’ve got dresses in my closet, charity to raise money for and gender norms to break. For each day in December, I’m wearing a dress to support the necessary work of the Dressember Foundation team, who have raised over $10 million dollars to battle human trafficking. 

Why a dress every day, when Dressember offers the option that men can just wear ties for the month instead?

1. Because ties are stupid and dresses are fun.

2. And because gender norms are stupid, too. Why does it matter what we wear? (I’m not talking about full drag. That’s Draguary, which is an entirely different charity month.) Just me, as I am, pulling some dresses out of the closet and wearing them... and raising money to help people who are being exploited around the world.

Dressember is rated Platinum by Guidestar and 100% by Charity Navigator, so you know your money is going to people who can make change happen.

Here are some ways you can help:

1. Donate, obviously. Even a dollar. Or two. Or five. GO CRAZY, PEOPLE. Make me raise my goal.

(1a. Or donate somewhere else if you want. Something local, something important to you, whatever. Again, even a few bucks helps and charities have been really hit hard this year.)

2. Join the team! You can wear dresses (or ties, if you’re boring), too!

3. Do you have an old XL dress or two lying around that you don’t know what to do with? I’m anywhere from a size 14 to a 20, depending on the dress. I’ll come get it and add it to my closet and then at the end of the month, I’ll donate dresses to a local charity.

Please visit Chris’ Dressember webpage to donate to this charity.

Wearing New York & Company

Dave Foley plays a femulating dentist in the 2004 film Employee of the Month.

Are we a Third Gender?

Do a little research and I think you will agree that we exemplify the definition of Third Gender. 

The primary difference between us and other Third Genders is that many of us do not present as Third Gender all of the time, whereas other Third Genders are full-time. 

“In some cultures being third gender may be associated with the gift of being able to mediate between the world of the spirits and world of humans. For cultures with these spiritual beliefs, it is generally seen as a positive thing, though some third gender people have also been accused of witchcraft and persecuted. In most western cultures, people who do not conform to heteronormative ideals are often seen as sick, disordered, or insufficiently formed.” 

That in a nutshell is why many of us are not full-time – we live in a society where rather than being accepted, we are excepted (or worse). On the other hand, some of us have shed all the pretenses of being male, let our Third Gender fly and damn the torpedoes – full speed ahead!

    

Wearing Boston Proper

Una Muxe
“In Zapotec cultures of Oaxaca (southern Mexico), a muxe (also spelled muxhe) is a person assigned male at birth who dresses and behaves in ways otherwise associated with women; they may be seen as a third gender.” (source: Wikipedia)

10 Years Ago Today

Before COVID-19, I actually dressed en femme and went out among the civilians. The following recounts such an outing that occurred 10 years ago today. 

Tuesday, I spent the day en femme.

I wore my argyle tunic, black ribbed tights and black mid-calf boots. After I looked in the mirror, I wondered if I was showing too much leg.

Lisa and Nancy at work wore similar outfits on Monday. Lisa wore leggings instead of tights, but they were form-fitting and could be mistaken for tights. So I figured that my tights could be mistaken for leggings, unless the viewer got real close.

Who was I trying to kid? 

You had to be myopic not to see that I was wearing tights. The ribbing gave them away. If the tights were a solid color, then mistaking them for form-fitting leggings was in the realm of possibility, but the ribbing was very apparent and to my knowledge, there is no such thing as ribbed leggings.

So why did I go out showing so much leg? Because after I looked in the mirror, I liked the way that I looked! 

I was out the door at 9:30 AM.

First, I wanted to see the man with all the toys, so I drove to the mall. I entered through JCPenney and spent about 20 minutes browsing through items in the woman’s clothing department. I saw a few items of interest and tried on a couple of jackets, but I discarded each one for different reasons. 

While I was in JCPenney, I was very self-conscious about my leggy outfit and I kept looking to see if I was attracting any attention. I noticed none, so I felt more comfortable with my appearance, and walked out into the mall.

At the center of the mall, I found Santa; he was ready for action and I was his first customer. I gave him a break and instead of sitting on his lap, I sat next to him.

While his elves snapped a couple of photos, I told Santa what I wanted for Christmas and he said that if I had been a good girl this year, he would see what he could do.

I chose which photo I thought was the best and the elves printed two copies of my pick to take home with me.

I exited the mall and drove to a strip of strip malls about ten minutes from the university where I would be doing outreach after noon. I intended to visit Dress Barn, Payless Shoes, Marshalls and Kohls, but by the time I finished visiting Dress Barn, it was time to drive to the university.

By the way, I tried on five dresses at “the Barn,” but bought none. Three were too small and the two that fit looked too big on me.

I arrived at the university and pulled up to the guard house that guarded the parking lot. After I explained why I was visiting the university, the guard said, “Park anywhere that is not reserved, Ma’am.”

“Thank you, sir.”

I parked the car, walked to class and on the way, a group of guys ogled me as I walked by.

“Thank you, guys.”

At the classroom, I met up with three other transgenders and the spouse of one. I had done outreach with all of them on many other occasions.

The two Human Sexuality classes had approximately 30 students each with females outnumbering males by about a 4-to-1.

The routine is that each of us spends about five minutes each telling our life stories in a nutshell. Then the students ask questions.

We hear many of the questions (like “How did you choose your female name?”) over and over again at each outreach, but there are always a few unique questions that require some thought to answer.

Yesterday, the students were very enthusiastic, had a lot good questions – so many so that we ran out of time before they had a chance to ask them all.

After the class, we read the students’ reactions to our presentations. I lost count of the number of reactions that admitted that before our presentations, the students thought that all transgenders were gay and now they learned that that urban legend is not true. Another common thread was that some of the students were apprehensive about our appearance, but afterwords, they felt very comfortable with us.

After the classes, I called it a day. I had not slept well the night before and I was exhausted, so I drove home and went to bed early. But before I fell asleep, I reflected on another fun and productive day out en femme and began looking forward to the next opportunity to be me.

Wearing J.Ing

Ving Rhames and fellow femulators in the 2000 film Holiday Heart