Snowed Out

I was disappointed that the weather ruined my plans to attend the local Avon representatives holiday party last night.

The snow stopped falling at 4 PM. I finished removing the snow from my driveway and sidewalks at 5:30 PM. The town removed the snow off the street at 7 PM; black ice was scheduled to begin forming soon at 7:30 PM. The party started at 6:30 PM.

I was surprised that the party was not postponed considering the weather and road conditions, but at 4:30 PM, an e-mail arrived informing me that the party was still on. I imagine that the headcount at the party was lower than usual… at least by one.

I had a cute outfit picked out and ready to wear. I hope I will have another opportunity to wear it out real soon now.

By the way, the photo above was taken exactly one year ago when I was getting ready to go to last year’s Avon rep holiday party.

 

 

 

Obi-Wan Kenobi femulating in the 1949 British film Kind Hearts and Coronets.

 

 

 

Wearing Single Plus.

Miss Eng'g 2013

Miss Engineering 2013 will be selected in the ultimate womanless beauty pageant on December 19 at the College of Engineering, University of Philippines-Diliman. Although the pageant is next Thursday, the Miss Engineering Facebook page already has hundreds of photographs (with more to come) documenting the pageant and its preliminary events.

It is still snowing here as I type this and I have pretty much abandoned any hope of going to the Avon representatives holiday party tonight.

Thank you, Juliet Ventura for alerting me about Miss Eng'g 2013.

 

 

 

Actor Raul Gonzalez femulating in television’s Desplerta America, 2013.

 

 

 

Wearing Diana von Furstenberg.

Avon Reps and Valley Girly Boys

Tuesday evening is the holiday party for the local Avon representatives. I have attended the party in the past and on those occasions, I was the only male Avon rep en femme. Yet, the female Avon reps treated me just like one of the girls and I always had a wonderful time.

This year the party venue is nearby and very convenient, but the weather forecast is not good. The latest from the National Weather Service calls for snow between noon and 7 PM; the party starts at 6:30 PM. Nuts!

I don’t like driving in a snowstorm especially at night. I hope the forecast is wrong.

In case you missed it, I just wanted to let you know that the feminization of males continues. A report released last week by the Acoustical Society of America revealed that "more young men in California rise in pitch at the end of their sentences when talking."

According to BBC, "This process is known as 'uptalk' or 'valleygirl speak' and has in the past been associated with young females, typically from California or Australia. But now a team says that this way of speaking is becoming more frequent among men."  

Thank you, Gwen and Jaye Anne for alerting me to this news.

Japanese femulator Mimo-Momo. 

Wearing Madeleine.

Did You Get My Message?

By Paula Gaikowski

In the transgender community, the use of the terms “pass” or “passing” is controversial.  What’s ironic is that we all use it in one form or another, but camouflage it with politically correct language. What’s even more interesting is if you ever go to Reddit’s  Transpassing or any one of the other related sub Reddits you would discover that the younger members of our community didn’t get the memo and talk about passing all day long.

I prefer to use the phrase “present as a woman."  If I am looking for a comment, I’ll ask how was my presentation.  With all that being said, we all have some very definite opinions about the issue. Before you click the comment link below, let me say a few things first.

What made the subject very clear and even defined for me the why we do this was something my wife said to me a few weeks ago. Having recently traded in her shoulder length hair for a pixie cut, she was still getting comfortable with such short hair. While we were getting ready for a Saturday morning of fellowship and brush-cutting at the church picnic grove, she put on blue jeans and a flannel shirt. I’ll admit discreetly to the 5000 or so readers of Femulate that she did look a bit boyish.

One look in the mirror brought about a shriek. Not expecting this response, I looked over and asked, “What’s the matter, honey?”

“Oh my gosh, I look like a man!” she blustered as she headed for her closet.

After 29 years of marriage, I came back with a practiced response that I learned before my first anniversary, “Sweetheart, you look beautiful.”

As she positioned herself in front of the mirror, this time in a jean skirt and scalloped linen top, she breathed a sigh of relief,  “There, I at least want the people to know that I am a woman!”

Wow, Bam, Bazinga! Yes read it again ladies: “There, I at least want the people to know that I am a woman!”

Transgender women just want the human race to know that we are women!

The hair, the makeup, clothes, lingerie, voice lessons, and of course, shoes are all gestures to the world that we are women. Just like the jean skirt and scalloped top that was nowhere near as practical for clearing brush that morning, they served a vital purpose for my wife; they signaled the world that she was a woman and validated her identity. It brought her appearance more in line with who she felt she was.

Just like the cowboy who wears his hat, jeans and boots in the airport, he is saying to the world, "These clothes reflect who I am, a culture that I belong to, a philosophy that I adhere too, and a vocation that I perform."

The banker, the rocker, and the professor --- they all send a message with their clothes.
That is the reason we do this --- we want people to know who we are. That deep down, under the five o'clock shadow and receding hairline, we all have to some varying extent the hearts and souls of feminine beings.

That’s why we so often ask about passing, presenting or how do I look? It is the reason why in the transgender community, we take more pictures than most tourists. Ever notice that you are the only person at the family reunion that knows exactly how to work the self-timer on the camera! We want acknowledgement, we are sending radio waves out into the Universe and listening, searching, longing to know if we are being heard.

With that in mind, instead of asking “Do I pass?”

Let’s try asking, "Did you get my message?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

Actor Guillaume Gallienne femulates as his mother in the
2013 French film Les Garçons et Guillaume, à-table!

Wearing ECI.

Snowball

In my opinion, as more males dress up as females, it encourages other males who are on the cusp to dress up as females. It is a snowball effect.

In the early 1960s, I was on the cusp. I was a feminine boy, but I had never dressed. Except for comics on television and actors in films, males dressing as females was unheard of in my little world.  Dressing as a female myself never even crossed my mind… until one Halloween.

I recall visiting my aunts' house on Halloween dressed as the Frankenstein Monster. My aunts were all aflutter about a neighborhood boy who had visited them earlier that evening dressed as a girl. He even wore stockings and high heels! Suddenly, dressing as a female myself crossed my mind.

Another Halloween, Billy, my best friend in grammar school urged me to join him trick-or-treating that year. He told me that he dressed as a girl the previous Halloween, planned to dress as a girl again this Halloween and suggested that I dress as a girl, too. I was intrigued, but as feminine as I was, I was not ready to dress as a female because I feared what people would think if I did dress up. (By the way, after adding a lot of twos and twos together, I am certain that Billy was transgender.)

About this time, I was exposed to female impersonators.

My father bought the New York Daily News every day and I noticed that at the end of the week, probably in the Thursday or Friday edition of the News, there would be a thumbnail-sized ad in the back pages of the paper that caught my eye. The ad always consisted of a photo of a gorgeous showgirl that was captioned "Who's No Lady?"

The gorgeous showgirl was no lady, but a female impersonator and the ad was for the 82 Club in New York City, a nightclub that featured female impersonators. I was amazed that males could look like the showgirls featured in those ads. I was so fascinated with the transformation that I began cutting out the ads from the newspaper and collecting them with a paperclip.

Then home alone one day, I started on a voyage that has never ended. I went to my parents' bedroom, found a pair of my my mother's nylon stockings and tried them on. This was so long ago that the stockings had seams (all stockings had seams back then) and my legs were still hairless.

After I slipped on the stockings, I opened my mother's closet to see how my legs looked in the full-length mirror hanging on the inside of the closet door. My legs still looked like my own legs except now they were covered by nylon.

Then it occurred to me that my mother's shoe collection was at my disposal inside the closet. I slipped on a pair of her high heel pumps and examined myself in the mirror again. My legs were no  longer boys'  legs encased in nylon; they had been transformed into a pair of shapely legs that any woman would die for!

After that eye-opener, I experimented with my mother's girdles, bras, dresses, hats, gloves, lipstick, rouge, etc. and got caught up in a snowball that has never stopped growing.

 

 

 

A postcard depicting the professional femulators of
New York City’s 82 Club (also known as “Club 82”), circa 1965.

 

 

 

Wearing Costa Blanca (skirt).

Just Once – That’s All It Takes

 

Femulating in 1970.

 

 

 

Wearing Madeleine.

Random Verbiage

While browsing eMusic, I came upon an album cover that set off my trans radar. The album is Popmusic Is My Life by a musical group named CRèME. The album cover reminded me of the back cover of Lou Reed's Transformer LP, which featured a person dressed as a female and a male.

I Googled and Binged, but did not find anything about CRèME that helped explain the album cover. I may be wrong, but I may be right.

***

Some people were apoplectic over the appearance of drag queens in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. The actors who paraded as drag queens are performing in Kinky Boots, the Broadway musical version of the film of the same name.

The apoplectic are the same people who don't want transwomen using ladies’ restrooms. They are so sad.

***

My wife’s surgery went well and she is recovering. Thank you all who asked about her and passed along your positive thoughts.

***

"There are so many qualities that make up a human being . . . by the time I get through with all the things that I really admire about people, what they do with their private parts is probably so low on the list that it is irrelevant."  –  Paul Newman

 

A blushing bride and her lovely femulating groom.

 

Wearing Madeleine.

Paula Visits Washington – Part 2

By Paula Gaikowski

My next stop was a bit of a stretch goal for myself. I have wanted to get out there as a woman doing things other than shopping; I wanted to interact more with others as a woman. 

George Washington University was having a fall open house. I went back to the room with my new eye makeup, restyled my wig, touched up the rest of my makeup and put on my dark suit that I bought when I was down in Atlanta.  I stopped at the front desk to ask the clerk for directions to the University and she told me how to get there with no look of surprise or shock.

I parked, walked up the steps of the University,  heels tapping, the autumn breeze cool around my legs; “So this is what it’s like,” I thought! I don’t remember being nervous coming into the lobby, where like any other open house, tables were set-up. I spoke with the receptionist and she gave me an overview, and I filled out a questionnaire.  She was friendly, and I believe she read me, but she didn’t miss a beat. I suspect people presume that I am transitioning, but that’s OK with me. In fact, it makes me feel good.

I waited on line to speak with the tech rep, but grew tired and slipped out. I needed to go back to the hotel and get my glasses. Once there, I rode up in the elevator with a businessman, who just said “hello” and asked me my floor number. I had a strange feeling riding the two of us alone. Standing there with both feet together, my arms instinctively crossed against my chest. I could see him in the reflection looking at my legs. Did he smell my perfume? Was he checking me out as I had done to so many women? What was he thinking? The tables had turned. I felt odd. I understood now.

I got my glasses headed out to The Cheese Cake Factory and enjoyed a nice dinner, had great service and was addressed as “Miss.” On my way back to the room, I stopped in the lobby and got a bottle of wine from the Marriott Market; the clerk charge it to my  room.

Off I went back to my room and the Cinderella turned back into a fella <sigh>! What was extraordinary about this trip was that I was going where I wanted, when I wanted with no inhibitions. Once I got into my “girl mindset,” I just went to the different stores and restaurants without thinking. I wasn’t acting like a woman anymore --- I was just being  myself. I am sure some of you girls can relate to this. It was a sea change, one that both thrills me and also scares me a bit.

In the past, when I finished a day out en femme, I was glad to put the pretty things away. This time, I wanted to get dressed again the next morning.

It’s not the clothes that interest me, it’s the lifestyle.

 

 

 

A girl and her guy/girl, circa 2013.

 

 

 

Wearing Paige Denim.

Paula Visits Washington

By Paula Gaikowski

I was up at 3:45 to catch an early flight to Washington Dulles Airport. My plane got in at 7:45 AM and I was at the hotel by 9 AM. I was dressed and out the door by 11 AM. It seems to take at least two hours to get ready these days. This trip came up rather fast, so I didn’t have a lot of time to pick out new outfits.

The first stop was, of course, my dear Nordstrom. I went up to the woman’s section looking for a formal dress. There was only one I was interested in. The sales associate offered to let me try it on. I took a photo, but really didn’t like the way it fit.

I made a run to Payless shoes and found a pair of boots that fit. They were $50 and had to pass. I know I am going to regret that.

After spending the morning trying on all those beautiful expensive clothes at the Dulles Towne Center, I decided to grab some lunch before going to Burlington Coat Factory. I found a Chili’s near-by, had a salad for lunch and once again, nothing out of the ordinary happened. It amazes me that I don’t attract attention; I watch very closely out of the corner of my eye, but don’t see any glances or whispers. I won’t say I pass, but I am doing something fairly well.

In the Burlington Coat, I found three suits that I tried on. One was too big, one was too small and one fit just right. The same suit was on the rack at Lord & Taylor for $240; here it was just $40 in clearance. I loved it. It was beautiful and it made me feel so pretty, but I passed on it because it was really made for a formal event and not the kind of suit one would wear to the office or shopping.

So without having bought anything, I decided to go back to the M·A·C counter back at Dulles Towne Center and have them freshen up my makeup. I wanted to try a new look on my eyes. Of course, the sales associate was the prettiest thing and most friendly.

I just want to add here that if you are a novice or a newbie and you are trying to spread your transgender wings, M·A·C should be your first stop. Whether en drab or en femme, they will greet you with acceptance and a helpful positive attitude. When I read posts from girls asking “Should I tell them it’s a gift?” I answer “No, sister, you tell them they're for me," and your life will open up.

When I chat with sales associates at M·A·C, I always am very open about being transgender. I find this is a great opportunity for outreach and education. What I have found is once you open up, they usually have a ton of questions. This time the big question was “Why?”

It’s hard to answer “Why” on the fly at the M·A·C counter. I adjusted my heels on the foot rest of the high make-up chair I was sitting in, looked down at my nails while I thought a minute, and said something like this, “I have always admired, respected, and envied woman. For as long as I can remember, I always wanted to either be like them or be one myself. After many years of guilt and anxiety, I realized I may be different, but not bad. I do this because I appreciate women and their attributes. I value their nurturing, gentleness, empathy, sensitivity and compassion."

I believe I made my point well; she stepped back, with a thoughtful look on her face, and said “Wow, that’s so beautiful, I wish more men felt that way.” I then thought to myself if more men did they would probably be women or transgender.

 Stunt man Bob Simmons femulating in the 1965 British film Thunderball.

Wearing Daily Look.

Still Hectic

Thank you all for your positive comments regarding my wife's surgery. She is doing good, but she will be recovering for awhile.

Things are still hectic here, but they are starting to fall into a routine. I am a very busy nurse and housewife!

I plan to catch up with my email ASAP, so that makes me a busy corresponding secretary, too.

Daily Makeover had an excellent article today "7 Eyeshadow Mistakes We All Make --- And Shouldn't." Even I learned something and I recommend it.

Hectic as Heck

Things are at an all-time high here hectic-wise.

My wife had major surgery on Monday and I have been going back and forth between home and the hospital for the past two days; the hospital, to keep her company and home, to finish three work assignments that had to be completed by the end of today. Luckily, the hospital is only 10 minutes from the house, so the commute has been easy.

My wife will be coming home later today and I will be playing nurse to her as she recovers. She will require a lot of attention initially, so my blogging time will be limited. (If I had not prepared the previous two blog posts ahead of time, it would have been very quiet here this week.) Meanwhile, the unanswered e-mails are piling up, but I promise to respond to them all as soon as possible.

I want to wish all my readers a Happy Thanksgiving and bon appétit.

Thursday in Two - Part 2

A Thursday Morning Selfie

Outreach

After shopping, I drove to the University and as I pulled into the parking lot where I normally park, I could not help noticing that most of the lot was torn up and under construction.

The guard, who is always gracious to me explained the situation: there was a parking garage down the street in one direction and another further down the street in the other direction and I could take a shuttle bus from the garages to bring me to the classroom. He added there were a limited number of visitor slots in what was left of the torn-up parking lot, but they were not likely to be available at that time of day. I decided to try the visitor slots first and I was a lucky girl as I found two empty slots side-by-side right across the street from the classrooms I would be visiting.

I arrived at the classroom and greeted the professor, Anna Schildroth, and the members of the outreach panel all of whom I had done outreach with in the past, two male-to-females, Maryann and Michelle, and one female-to-male, Quinton.

We started by briefly telling our trans life stories… about five minutes each and then the class splits up with Maryann and I handling questions from one half of the class and Maryann and Quinton handling the other half. Half way through the 75 minutes, we switch off. The logic of the pairings is that Maryann and I are no surgery, no hormone replacement therapy (HRT) transwomen, while Michelle and Quinton have had HRT and Quinton has had top surgery.

The students had a lot of questions and we did not have to pull teeth to extract them, which is nice. Most of the questions were the same or similar to ones we have fielded before, but I did receive one question that I never received before, “Where did you get your sense of style?”

That was not only a question, it was a compliment!

I explained that initially I learned a lot from my mother and that as I grew older, I became a follower of fashion and kept aware of fashion trends, as well as the classics of fashion.

A similar question we were asked was “Who was your role model?”

Again, my mother was the answer on a personal level and Jacqueline Kennedy on a non-personal level. A lot of the women in the class nodded in agreement when I mentioned Jacqueline Kennedy, which was surprising considering that Jackie died before most, if not all of these women were born.

One other question I received, “Do guys try to pick you up?” is one I do not recall receiving before, but was asked by students in both the early and late outreach sessions on Thursday. Go figure! 

After class, we went to the student center to eat and relax until the next class. On the way, I met up with Nora who was a student in the class I did outreach at back in April. She reads Femulate regularly and read that I was coming to the University on Thursday, so she planned to search me out. I was happy to see her again and she joined us at the student center, where we chatted over lunch about her home (Cairo, Egypt), high heel issues, and my lack of Tweeter activity. The time flew by and we had to say our goodbyes because it was time to do outreach with the second Human Sexuality class.

The set-up for the second class was different than the first class because two classrooms were not available. As a result, the class could not be split in half in order to optimize questions for Maryann and me or Michelle and Quinton. We all got our share of questions, but just fewer questions than there would have been if the class had been split in half.

The only unusual question in this session that I recall was directed at all of us. A woman asked “What would be your dream sexual encounter?” I do not remember how the others answered the question, but I did not answer the question because I felt uncomfortable answering it and I was sure how to answer it.

By the end of the class, I was very tired. It had been a very hectic week — sickness, surgery, death — one of those weeks you do not want to relive. Thursday’s day out provided a nice break from all that, although my iPhone kept me in the loop all day long. (What did we do before cell phones?)

The students in both classes thanked us — they always do  — and we thanked them for giving us the opportunity to show them that transgender are real people, too.

Femulating at a Lindsay for Mayor drag party in New York City, 1965.

Wearing Pierre Balmain (dress) and Just Cavalli (skirt).