kindred spirit

Surfing the net today, I came across the blog of a kindred spirit, Vickie Davis, who you might enjoy reading.

not sisters

Everyone thinks we're sisters, but we're actually mother and son.

(from a recent issue of The New Yorker)

just reward

I finished doing my taxes today. I don't usually wait this late, but I use tax software and my computer was in the shop during most of March in the repair queue waiting for a part.

It was worth the wait because after waiting so long, Apple decided to send me a new computer rather than make me wait any longer for mine to be fixed. This was a real sweet deal because my broken computer was over three years old, while its replacement is a brand new model, just released in January!

Anyway, I finished my taxes and I am getting the biggest refund I have ever received. And as a reward, I treated myself and bought this dress from Metrostyle 30% off list.

calendar

2008 March 29
Originally uploaded by staci-staci

I promise that this will be the last photo from the banquet that I will put on the blog. It is another from my friend Jamie.

The banquet is nearly a week past now and I still cannot get the thrill of temporarily being a woman out of my mind. So much so that I have been hatching plans for a day out en femme real soon now. Maybe a day at the casino, where I can play slots for an hour or two, eat lunch at a nice restaurant, and do some window shopping in the expensive stores that ring the casino (if I win at the slots, maybe I will even buy something).

I also began thinking seriously about attending the Be-All in Chicago at the end of May, which would include a 900-mile road trip en femme (never pumped gas en femme before).

And out of the blue, I received an e-mail yesterday asking if I'd be interested in doing outreach at a new venue: Wesleyan University. A professor is looking for a plain vanilla heterosexual crossdresser to speak at her class later this month, so I provided the dates I can appear.

It looks like my en femme calendar is filling up nicely.

more banquet photos

2008 March 29
Originally uploaded by staci-staci

This is one of the photos my friend Jamie sent me from my support group's banquet on Saturday night.

It seems that most of the attendees had digital cameras and they were using them; it was "The Night of a Thousand Flashes."

party likes it's 1997

My friend Michelle sent me a photo from 1997 attending my first Connecticut Outreach Society (COS) banquet. (I believe it was also the first COS banquet ever held).



We were crowded in a very small hotel banquet room and there was an assigned restroom nearby that we were supposed to use. Rebel rebel that I am, when nature called, I took the elevator down to the ground floor and used a real women's restroom and I remember being thrilled that the female patrons in the ladies' inner sanctum paid no attention to me!

voice training

Laura Kane sent me this link to an amazing YouTube video in which a young transwoman demonstrates how she attains a realistic female voice. Her technique is similar to the technique I have tried, but her results are a lot better than mine!

Even if you have no interest in using a female voice, watch the video for its entertainment value because you will be surprised (at least I was) when she switches to her male voice.

Saturday night

Saturday night I attended my support group's annual banquet. It is a dress-up affair and I always dress to impress.



Ready

For months, I planned to wear the dress I bought from Victoria's Secret last fall, a black sleeveless V-neck tunic-style sweater dress with sequin on the front.



I did my makeup for a glam look. I wore false eyelashes and instead of the various shades of brown that I normally use to do my eyes, I used grays and blacks.

Patty, my fashion advisor, thought that I should wear my short blonde wig with that dress and I agreed. However, just for the heck of it, I also took out my mid-length blonde wig and my shoulder-length dark auburn wig to see which looked best after I did my makeup and dressed.

I tried on the mid-length blond wig and rejected that look. Next came the short blond wig and it looked very good. Finally, I shook out the shoulder-length dark auburn wig, plopped it on my head, and fell in love with the way it looked with my makeup and outfit.

I checked myself out in the full length mirror and something was not right. The V-neck of the dress revealed a large expanse of chest, which was as flat as a board. The dress screamed for something more.

I slipped off my dress. Then, I filled my bra cups with my homemade birdseed breast forms, which lifted my natural size A cup breasts up and brought them together. I used strips of surgical tape to bring them even closer together to create cleavage. I used some eyeshadow to make the cleft of my cleavage look deeper and then I powdered my whole breast area with translucent powder.

I slipped on my dress, looked in the mirror, and was very happy with the way I looked; I thought I actually looked a little "sexy" for a change. At the banquet, my friend Jamie said I looked like "a hottie," so I guess my assessment was correct.

After I took a few photos, I put on some Chanel No. 5 and did my nails. This was my first time using Kiss pre-glued stick-on nails and after a night of wearing them, I am impressed.

The largest Kiss nail was larger than the largest nail that Revlon provided with their defunct Maximum Speed pre-glued nails, which I used in the past. With the Revlon Maxies, the largest nail did not cover my thumbnail completely; there was a small gap. With the largest Kiss nails, there was no gap; the Kiss nails covered my thumbnails completely.

Also, the glue of the Kiss nails is a lot stronger than the Revlons. Once the Kiss nails were stuck on, they stayed on. I was very satisfied with the Kiss brand of nails and recommend them highly.

Set

I was out the door at 5:20 PM for the 25-minute drive to the hotel in Meriden, CT, that was hosting the banquet. The drive was uneventful and I arrived in plenty of time for the 6 PM cocktail hour.

Go

There were 55 paid guests and I assume that most of them showed up. I recognized about half the faces; the other half were new to me.

Some of the people I recognized did not recognize me; I guess I looked different than I usually looked. For example, I sat with a new acquaintance, Nicole, for over five hours at our support group's table at True Colors just two weeks earlier. Nicole did not recognize me at the banquet until they announced my name preceding my lip-sync performance during the follies portion of the evening.

Speaking of True Colors… I wore the same pair of heels at the banquet that I wore at True Colors and they did not bother me at all Saturday night, whereas they killed my feet at True Colors.

There were more genetic women in attendance than ever; probably one-fifth to one-quarter were genetic women, mostly significant others, as well as a contingent from a local nail/waxing establishment. One of the contingent complimented me on my dress.

My friend Deja was snapping photos, so I twisted her arm to take some photos of me in a more scenic area, i.e., the beautifully decorated lobby of the hotel. She agreed, but on the way to the lobby, we passed the swimming pool area and it looked as nice as the lobby, so we used it for my mini-photo shoot. (Two photos from that photo shoot appear here.)

I sat at the Board of Directors table, so I had the pleasure of conversing with our after-dinner speaker, Moonhawk River Stone. His after-dinner speech was inspiring and I was moved to become even more trans active. Coincidentally, at the banquet, my support group's executive director informed me that I am officially the editor of the group's monthly newsletter (I had been subbing for the past few months for the previous editor).

I was nervous as the time drew near for my lip sync performance. I was first up and relieved to get it over with! I think I did OK. I did not flub the words and everyone enjoyed the song I selected to lip sync, an obscure Lesley Gore semi-hit from the 1960s titled "Sometimes I Wish I Were a Boy."

When I returned to our table after performing, Moonhawk River Stone mentioned that he loved my song selection, which made me feel a lot better about my performance.

I mingled a lot through the evening. I became reacquainted with girls I had not seen for many months and in a few cases, many years. I also mingled with some of the new faces in attendance. I even met and chatted with one of my blog's regular readers, Chris. (Hi, Chris!)

I really enjoyed myself Saturday night. I thought I looked my best and that made me feel wonderfully womanly. Nothing could ruin my night except its end, which came around 12:20 AM when I decided to call it a night and drove home.

three thousand words

They say a picture's worth a thousand words, so here are three photos from my night out yesterday.


I am at home dressed to kill and ready for my big night out.


Enjoying myself posing next to the pool at the hotel that hosted our banquet.


A close-up of me and my friends.

big night tonight

Tonight is my support group's annual banquet, which is the trans-event of the year around here. It gives me an opportunity to dress to kill and you can be sure I will not waste that opportunity.

You can expect a full report and photos here tomorrow, sooner, or later.

male female models redux

Back in October 2007, I wrote about the urban legend that some of the fashion models wearing female finery on the catwalks of the fashion world are actually males.

Today, Anonymous commented that, "terri(sp?)toye was a transsexual high fashion model in the 70's. catwalks, some print ads...tho' not much can u find on her"

I Googled "terri toye," discovered that her name was "teri toye" (one r, not two). Google found some information on her including this Web page, which is a gallery of her work as a model.

validation

There is a message thread about validation on the MHB (My Husband Betty) Message Boards. Some people seemed concerned that when they receive a compliment about their appearance ("You look great"), the person making the compliment is really saying, "You look great... for a tranny."

So? I'd rather look "great" for a tranny than look lousy for a tranny!

I appreciate any compliment I receive, whether the person making the compliment reads me as a tranny or not. Perhaps, the nicest compliment I have ever received was, "You look better than most women I know."

You can't get much better validation than that!

Life as a Tall Girl

From today's New York Times, the story about a woman who is 6-foot-4... and she wears heels!

Saturday night outing

My support group's annual awards banquet is Saturday night. It is the local T-event of the year.

In recent years, the banquet headcount has been in the 60 to 70 range. I wonder if the economy ("The Bush Era of Prosperity") will have any effect on the headcount. I hope not because, as they say, "the more, the merrier."

The weather forecast for Saturday night is "mostly cloudy, with a low around 24." I plan to wear the cocktail dress I bought from Victoria's Secret last fall. Like a lot of what Victoria sells, my dress is skimpy, so I will have to wear one of my fake fur coats to fight off the cold temps Saturday night.

I will be performing in the "follies" after dinner is served. I lip sync and for this year's performance, I found a very obscure song from the early 1960s that I think will be very apropos for the event; the theme of the song is gender envy.

As usual, you can expect a full report here after the fact with lots of photos, too.

easter envy

Easter is not a big holiday in my family. We hardly notice it.

It was different when I was a kid. My family were practicing Roman Catholics, so it was a big holiday for us back then.

Our usual Easter routine was Mass on Sunday morning, dinner with the whole family at my aunt's house Sunday afternoon, and an egg hunt for the kids after dinner.

In preparation for Easter, Mom would get new Easter outfits for herself and my sister. My Dad and I wore whatever suit was the most recent addition to our wardrobes.

I was jealous of my sister. She usually got a new dress, new shoes, and a new hat for Easter. My female cousins got dolled up for Easter, too, meanwhile I was stuck in a boring suit.

Saturday, I will make up for my Easter envy and get dressed to kill for my support group's annual banquet. I can't wait!

the funny thing about black men in dresses

Why do black comedians like Tyler Perry, Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence don plus-size pantyhose and parade around as their feisty grandmas?

Read why here.

catwalk

I wish I lived in the Bay Area to participate in this event!

CATWALK, a new elite modeling competition that caters to the Transgender Community (male to female). The time has come for a modeling competition that embodies, class, beauty, style, fashion at its best! Its’ purpose is to encourage and empower the TG community to excel in the fast evolving world of fashion and unique marketing.

CATWALK, represent a new outlook for the transgender community. As the TG community is rapidly growing, empowerment, advocacy and leadership is instilled in this competition to secure proper representation of what the new TG community represents.

CATWALK corresponds to a cause! It is an event that responds to the HIV/AIDS epidemic and offers assistance unconditionally to serve the greater human race.

CATWALK symbolizes excitement, drama, pride, fun, movement, arts, delight, progrH style, evolution, pleasure, fashion, compassion, people, community and YOU!

Here is the CATWALK Web site.

Friday Q and A

During my True Colors workshop on Friday, folks asked a lot of questions.

Some were the same or similar to ones I have answered before.

Some were new and here are the ones that I remember:

Q: The way you move your hands and gesture is very feminine. Are you doing that intentionally?

A: It is not intentional.

I gestured while answering the question and suddenly became aware that my hand gestures were indeed feminine, which gave me pause.

I know that consciously, I am not acting any differently en femme and en homme. Maybe my subconscious is responsible for my feminine mannerisms.

Maybe it is context, i.e., I am acting the same en femme and en homme, but when I am en femme, those mannerisms look more feminine because I am dressed from head-to-toe like a woman. I recall crossdressing for a Halloween party in college and an acquaintance who knew me in boy mode, said that while crossdressed, he noticed that my mannerisms were the same when I was in boy mode, but that they were definitely feminine.

Maybe my mannerisms are feminine en femme and en homme, which would explain why I have been called a "fairy," "faggot," "twinkie," etc.


Q: Do you buy your clothes in a "big" women's store?

A: Not necessarily. I am a size 16 or 18 above the waist and a size 14 or 16 below the waist, so sometimes I find clothes that fit in the "Misses" section and sometimes in the "Women's" section.

Q: Are you happy with your male body image?

A: Yes


Q: What would you do if you could do it over again?

A: I would live 24/7 as a woman without hormones and surgery, but I would have electrolysis.


Q: Do you ever feel that you are really a female?

A: No was my quick reply, but on reflection, when I am en femme, sometimes I feel that I am really a female.

Friday fotos

Here are two photos from my Friday out en femme (click on the photos to enlarge them).

Here I am staffing my support group's table at the True Colors Conference.








Hanging out in the UCONN Student Union just like I did when I attended the university back in the 1970s except now I am dressed very differently.

fond of new found nails

Back in December, I mentioned that Revlon discontinued their Maximum Speed line of pre-glued stick-on nails, which I wore whenever I went out en femme. I stocked up on Max Speedies via eBay, but my supply is dwindling, so I have been searching for a replacement.

I think I have found it: Kiss Broadway pre-glued nails.

Kiss has a wider selection of pre-glued stick-on nails than Revlon ever had and the package that I bought has wider nails, too. I compared the largest Revlon nail with the largest Kiss nail and the Kiss nail is noticeably wider, which is a godsend to girls like us with larger than the average female fingers.

I have not worn my Kiss nails out yet, so I don't know how well they stay on. However, I plan to wear them to our annual banquet on the 29th and I will report back then.