Wearing Venus |
Sid Silvers femulating in the 1935 film Broadway Melody of 1936. |
Colin Baker femulating Marlene Dietrich on British television’s This Morning. You can view this femulation on YouTube. |
There is a joke that has been around the transgender community for awhile that goes like this:
What's the difference between a crossdresser and a transsexual?
Three years.
The joke implies that when someone realizes that he or she is a crossdresser, it takes three years to realize that he or she is a transsexual.
There is some truth to that joke. I have witnessed many folks come out as crossdressers, only to come out as transsexuals three or so years later.
But, sometimes it takes longer.
After crossdressing for over four decades, I recently came to the realization that I am a woman.
I am not a woman trapped in a man’s body, I am really a woman. I think as a woman, I emote as a woman, I act as a woman, I speak as a woman and whenever the opportunity arises, I present as a woman. To most of my acquaintances, I am the most womanly male they know and that’s because I really am a woman.
True, my container is male (more or less), but its contents are 100% female.
I am very averse to fooling around with my container. Many things can go wrong and so far, my container has held up pretty well, so why mess with it. As a result, I have no interest in taking hormones or having surgery to modify my container so that it matches its contents.
I am very happy being a woman and very glad that I am not a “man.” I might be happier if I could present as a woman all of the time, but I have made choices in my life that make that impossible. So I live part-time as a male and part-time as a female, but no matter how I live, I am a woman all the time.
Whatever works.
Wearing Jonathan Simkhai |
Richard E. Grant en femme in the British film Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. |
In honor of our favorite holiday on Sunday, I am reposting past Halloween posts every Friday in October. The following is a repost from my old blog, dated October 2006.
Saturday was fabulous!
My makeup went on flawlessly. I think that after 40 years, I am starting to get the hang of it! I was trying to achieve that big eye look that was popular back in the late 1960’s and I think I did a good job of replicating it. False eyelashes were the key to achieving the look. I was very happy with the results.
Darn fishnets started tearing as soon as I pulled them up over my fanny, but the tear was in the crotch and did not spread, so I left well enough alone. After I put on the dress and the boots, I looked just like another swingin’ chick of the ’60’s!
I was ready to go at 5:30 PM, which was much too early for heading out to my support group’s meeting/party, so I decided to visit my friends Patty and Ron and let them see my costume. I called to make sure they would be home (they would) and then I hit the road.
I wanted to stop and buy some pastry for the party. I remembered that the local IGA’s have nice pastry, so I stopped at the IGA in Southington to shop for the sweets. Note well that with my go-go boots, I am about 6 feet 5 inches tall and dressed unlike anyone else in the store. I walked to the extreme opposite corner of the store where the bakery was located and I did not notice anyone noticing me, neither customers or store staff.
I picked up some strawberry and cheese mini-Danishes and proceeded to the cashier. There were two lines, each with about 4 or 5 customers. As is my way, I managed to choose the slow line and was stuck right behind an elderly couple who were taking their sweet time unloading their shopping cart.
A 30-something woman in the other line noticed me and smiled while checking me out intently. I don’t know if she was smiling because she liked my costume or because she realized I was male. I was hoping that we would leave the store at the same time and that she might say something, but with Ma and Pa taking their sweet time in front of me, she was long gone by the time I checked out.
As Ma was removing the last item from her carriage, she noticed me, gave me the once over, then turned to the business at hand, i.e., paying the cashier.
I was next. The male cashier asked, “How I was doing this evening?” and showed no signs that he knew I was crossdressed. I paid for the pastry and exited the store truly amazed at how anti-climatic it all had been.
I visited Patty and Ron and met their two bijon frise dogs. Everyone including the dogs, seemed to like my costume.
Then, I headed up to West Hartford for the party. There was a nice crowd... about 15 to 20 people, most in costume. It seemed that almost everyone brought some goodies to eat. It was quite a sweet spread!
I received a number of compliments for my costume and makeup. That was nice!
I guess most everyone had a good time because the meeting/party did not break up until after 11 PM, which is the latest I have ever seen a support group meeting break up.
Wearing New York & Company |
Couple crossdressed for Halloween |
Over the weekend, I came across a copy of the November issue of Reader’s Digest and I was very surprised to see an item in the magazine’s “Life in these United States” section: a cute photo of a young boy and girl crossdressing as a bride and groom.
The photo illustrated an item titled “He’s a Family Man” submitted by the grandmother of a five-year-old boy, who wrote, “When I asked my five-year-old grandson why he was so anxious to turn six, he replied, ‘So I can finally get married and have kids!’”
Wearing ModCloth |
David Tennant femulating on British television’s Rab C. Nesbitt. You can view this femulation on YouTube. |
To make matters worse, instead of welcoming a newcomer and trying to make me feel comfortable, I got the cold shoulder. After less than a half-hour, I got out of Dodge, drove home and swore that was my first and last support group meeting.
But I had to get out of the house en femme and even though the support group meeting hall was just another closet, it was a step out of the home closet, so I went back. And the second time, a couple of people talked with me and I started feeling more welcomed.
It is likely that when a newcomer shows up at a support group meeting, it is her first time out of the home closet. She is probably very stressed out and needs all the help she can get.
I never forgot that first meeting and I promised myself that whenever a newcomer showed up, I would go out of my way to welcome her and chat with her if she was so predisposed.
I made some long-time friends that way.
Piotr Gawron-Jedlikowski femulating Magdalena Narozna on Polish television’s Twoja Twarz Brzmi Znajomo (Your Face Sounds Familiar) You can view the femulation on YouTube. |
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In her Friday post, Rhonda (of Rhonda's Escape fame) cited an article that explains how the Femulation Nation’s national anthem, Shania Twain’s “Man! I Feel Like A Woman!” was inspired by crossdressers.
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Wearing Isabel Marant |
Tom Hanks and the late Peter Scolari femulating in the television comedy Bosom Buddies. |