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9 June 2011 by kathleen.
If you are a woman, men assume you have essential genes — like the gene that bestows knowledge of curtains and stuff like that. You know, women’s stuff. I want you to be aware of your genes because if it hasn’t happened to you already, it could happen any time, like this:
I was walking through a Super K-Mart this afternoon, minding my own business and headed for the door. A male voice called out, “Can you help me with this?” I don’t work for the store, and I didn’t think I looked the least bit that I worked for K-Mart, but I looked around anyway.
A man in his mid-fifties was looking at me with two items in his hand. “Can you help me with this?” he asked again with a studied look of confusion on his face.
“I don’t work here,” I replied.
“I know,” he said, “but you’re a woman and you know about these things.”
What would you do? Would you ignore him and get away as quickly as you could? Would you tell him to find store employee? Or would you do what I did and try to help him?
His question was about shower curtain liners. In his hands he had a clear plastic liner and a cloth liner. He knew what a shower curtain was and why you use a liner, but he couldn’t understand how a liner could be cloth — he’d never heard of that. I explained that cloth liners launder more easily, to wash out the soap scum. That answer seemed to satisfy him.
I am shameless that way: I make things up. I never had anyone ask me how a shower curtain liner works, have you? I mean, I make up my face, so why can’t I make up an answer? Besides, if you have the curtain gene, like I do, you just know these things.
Posted in Sex & Gender Roles | 1 Comment »
22 May 2011 by kathleen.
Watch women: we grab one elbow with the opposite hand, and fold the arms next to each other. This is not the same as the defensive crossing of the arms in front of the chest, which both men and women do. Instead it is almost like hugging yourself. I read somewhere that, standing or sitting, women tend to curl in on themselves in an effort to take up as little space as possible. Hugging one’s self this way is congruent to that assertion.
Men standing around waiting, can slouch and put one or both hands in their pockets. Many women’s slacks and skirts don’t have pockets over the hips: their hips are wider. Even if a pair of slacks has side pockets, they are not nearly as deep as the side pockets on men’s pants.
So, men and women tend to take different postures when they are in a neutral or waiting mode. Men have their arms at their sides with hands in the side pockets; women fold their arms without crossing them, and hug themselves.
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20 May 2011 by kathleen.
Within the first few weeks of starting work as Kathleen, in December, 2007, I distinctly remember a feeling of discomfort as I walked down a corridor at work — and someone was behind me!
I can’t speak for you, but as a heterosexual male I frequently watched women’s butts; truth be told, I still do, but now I try to be discreet. And, the proverbial shoe is on the other proverbial foot as well: I am still self-conscious when someone is walking behind me. Yes, Kathleen, that’s the way it is. Get over it.
That’s part of the dynamic of heterosexual male-female interactions: men look at women, and women try not to get caught looking at men. Thirty-five years ago, and I still thought I was nothing more than a crossdresser, I would occasionally go out to a local mall crossdressed. I didn’t do that very often because I was sure everyone was looking at me. Well, maybe they were looking at me: people look at reasonably attractive young women (OK, 35 years ago I was sort of young!).
Men don’t care about your sexual preference. Whether you prefer men or women, or no one at all, if you are in public, men believe they have the right to stare at you. It doesn’t work in reverse, however; men are really twitchy about anyone, male or female, staring at their butts. So, part of letting go of maleness is getting used to men looking at you — and especially at your butt.
Posted in Sex & Gender Roles, General MtF topics | 1 Comment »
16 May 2011 by kathleen.
I am retired; I am not working any more. That doesn’t mean I do nothing all day, but the rhythm of retired life is different. I imagine it’s different, too, if you are out of work because of a layoff, but you are not yet old enough to retire. Or perhaps you’re a student: your dress requirements are probably pretty loose.
When I was working, five days a week I had to be presentable as a woman before I left the house at 7:30am. Being a transwoman is more demanding when you have to pass to keep your job.
For forty-five years I had to pass as a man. Did you ever think about that: you’re passing as a man now, but you’re really a woman. Yeah, I hated it, and partly I hated it because I had to do something that wasn’t “natural” to me (whatever that means!). But I had to do it to keep the job.
When I was a government contractor, “it” was wearing a coat and tie winter and summer. When I was a welder, “it” was clothing myself neck to toes in garments heavy enough to block the burning ultraviolet rays from arc or TIG welding winter and summer. If you are a transwoman employed in a secretarial or retail position, for you “it” probably means a skirt or dress and panyhose every day.
Thank the Lord I was spared that trial! While I was working, I had a technical position, and slacks with kneehighs was just fine most days. But now that I’m retired, I only wear nice slacks, a blouse, and heels when I go to church; otherwise it’s jeans or capris and sandals or flats.
When you are reading this and other trans-oriented blogs, try to keep in mind the context from which the blogger is writing. Not all of what you read may apply to you — that goes for this blog as well!
Posted in Passing, AutoBiog, Sex & Gender Roles | 1 Comment »
12 May 2011 by kathleen.
To keep myself active in retirement, I walk about 45 minutes three times a week. Because I wear a hairpiece, wind and rain are serious threats — so I walk in a local mall. I talked about my experiences mall-walking and the resident carpet cruisers earlier this year.
The 60-somethings and 70-somethings all walk the same direction (counterclockwise) around the mall. We follow each other like a line of ants at a picnic. Knowing that people are behind me, I am conscious how my gait may look to someone behind me. I pay particular attention when I pass someone: for a least a few paces they will probably be paying a bit more attention to me because I will be just a few feet in front of them.
I wrote a year or so ago about camouflaging your walk, but the point of that post was to make sure you are not unexpectedly recognized as your male self if you are not out. What goes through my mind now is that if I walk with a male gait, the incongruity between my appearance as a woman and my movement as a man might call attention to me. So, I try to adjust my gait to make it look a bit more like I have a female pelvis.
Most, though not all, women tend to move their hips when they walk — more so than men move. The movement is usually up and outward toward the left side, then up and outward toward the right side. I have noticed a few women rotating the hips slightly front-to-back on one side and back-to-front on the other, especially when they are walking fast.
Please note that I do not feel a shouldness about my gait. I am choosing to alter my gait to minimize the chance that someone will be surprised when they watch me walk. I have not forgotten my male origin, and I don’t want to be associated with maleness at all, ever, in any aspect of my life.
Posted in AutoBiog, Sex & Gender Roles | 1 Comment »
31 January 2011 by kathleen.
My last couple of posts were a bit on the heavy side. Let me lighten up….
Most human beings have three kinds of color-detecting cells (cone cells) in the retina. For most people, that set pretty much covers the range of what we call “visible” light. Color-blindness is caused by defect or absence of one or more of the kinds of color cells, and color-blind people have limited coverage of the spectrum.
Some humans, however, actually have the ability to perceive more colors because they have a fourth kind of cone cell. The fourth kind of cone cell multiplies by as much as 100X the number of colors the person can perceive. Because the genes which carry this ability are located on the X chromosome, the Wikipedia article on tetrachromacy indicates that as many as 50% of women and 8% of men may have this condition.
I find tetrachromacy interesting because it suggests that the folklore about women being more sensitive to color may have a basis in fact. I blogged about colors a few months ago. The link in that post to the color chart is amusing, and I think, close to reality for many people. Now that I have more colors to choose from, the differences among the shades of red in the 8-10 red blouses in my closet is important. The red in the roses in a skirt will go with one or two of the blouses, but not with the rest.
Posted in Sex & Gender Roles | 1 Comment »
30 October 2010 by kathleen.
When I posted a response to Elizabeth Marie’s comment I left out the hardest part: that the spouse becomes lesbian after the husband’s transition.
I discussed my comment with my partner a few minutes after I posted it. She immediately pounced on my omission: the social component of a two females living together. Physical intimacy is no more public between two women than it is between a man and a woman. But couples are together publicly: at a cookout or a picnic; at the company Christmas party; at the neighborhood Halloween party; at birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, and funerals.
I have been a woman at work for nearly three years now. I see that I am not the same as my heterosexual coworkers. I am not taking care of children as the 20-somethings and 30-somethings are; I am not devoted to my grandchildren as the 40-somethings and 50-somethings are; I am not constantly dieting so my husband won’t run off with a younger woman. And I see that those women in the office who do not deny being lesbian, have very little social interaction with the apparently heterosexual women.
The social situation isn’t bad, but it is different for two women living together. A woman who is fundamentally heterosexual has built a life and created a circle of friends around the interests, needs, and desires of other women who like men. So, yes: if her husband becomes a woman, she will experience a monumental disruption of social relationships.
I put this post into the category “Sex and Gender Roles” because I can observe what Deborah Tannen described in her book You Just Don’t Understand — that women need and value their relationships with other women more than men value or need relationships with other men. Relationships are what women do. I am still learning that skill; transwomen have to learn that it is a skill.
I don’t have an answer for Elizabeth Marie’s spouse. My partner and I are still working out just how a woman and her transwoman spouse will function in society. The result is not necessarily ugly or painful, but at this point in our lives together (we married in mid 1976, I transitioned in late 2007) we are still discovering how we work together socially as two women.
When I was still a man, I had no important relationships with other men; I had very little to lose when I transitioned. My partner risked many relationships; she survived, but how well or poorly she did is not my story to tell. I will encourage her to write her own post on the topic or to comment on this one.
Posted in Being/staying married, Sex & Gender Roles | 1 Comment »
14 August 2010 by kathleen.
What it means to be male:
This is the way it has been in human cultures throughout the world, and the way it still is. The situation is not your fault; it may not even be your choice. Deny it if you choose, but as physically male, you came into the world surrounded by a different frame of reference than your female siblings.
Your mother, your sisters, your wife — they honor your choices before their own. That doesn’t mean you always got your way when you were growing up, or later as an adult. But your choices, your wants, your desires have taken precedence over your women’s choices whether you were aware of it or not.
More than that: you were most likely brought up to believe that your opinion matters. The majority of women alive today, and throughout history, have not been allowed to even hold an opinion; participating in a choice is not an option. Women have been property, owned first by their fathers, then by their husbands. Rape was not an offense against the woman who was raped; it was an offense against the father or husband.
Into that historical milieu comes you, with your privileges and your right to an opinion — and your desire to wear a dress. Unlike those who were brought up subject to father/brother/husband, you expect that your opinion has validity even when you’re wearing a dress. You can keep that myth alive while you keep your testicles, but you abandon that privilege when you transition.
All equality discussions aside: you had better cease demanding privileges if you want to be treated as a woman. That does not mean you must become a door mat; no, not at all. But, in giving up your testicles, you give up the right to demand more importance or better treatment than the women around you receive. Insisting that you receive better treatment is a sure way to make your partner boiling mad, and practically guarantees a chilly reception from your female neighbors, coworkers, and friends.
If you have not yet transitioned, or don’t plan to, you can still consider whether the exercise of male privilege is appropriate for you — especially if you crossdress in public. Nothing will draw more attention to your masculine physique and your rugged features than an attitude that says, “Serve Me”.
Posted in Sex & Gender Roles, General MtF topics | 1 Comment »
4 August 2010 by kathleen.
Walking around with red wax smeared around your mouth; trying to look like you’re actually walking on wedge-shaped blocks of wood; freezing in the summer air conditioning to show off bare shoulders and views of your mammaries; hobbling your gait with a short skirt, and acting like you’re actually demure and modest.
We have to be ridiculous! It’s a duty. Men cannot be ridiculous, at least not while they’re sober. They have Important Work to do.
That is what you can do for those around you: let them experience the joy of being ridiculous vicariously, through you. Don’t hold back the way you did when you were male — no no, jump right into it, feet first, skirts flying. Live enthusiastically! Live fully! Let your light shine brightly to all those around you. Bring them joy! Bring them your love!
Posted in Sex & Gender Roles, General MtF topics | 1 Comment »
25 July 2010 by kathleen.
I wrote a week or so ago about the value of chatting, but I didn’t explain how to chat.
I can start with an example. Back in the ’70’s there was a British series called Fawlty Towers. John Cleese and Prunella Scales played Basil and Sybil Fawlty, owners of a small, seaside hotel in the south of England. In a third of the episodes or more, there was a scene in which Sybil was on the telephone with one girlfriend or another. You only heard one side of the conversation, Sybil’s, which inevitably went like this, “Oh, I know…… Oh, I know….. Oh, I knooooow…….” to unheard remarks.
Men don’t get it; men think it’s funny. The value in Sybil’s repeated phrase is feedback to the other party. It doesn’t much matter how she feeds back, it’s only important that she does so. Her girlfriend knows that she, Sybil, is listening. Sybil is repeatedly giving her friend small, innocuous positive strokes.
There: I’ve the the cat out of the bag. Chat to give your girlfriends positive strokes. Praise them; remark on the colors they’re wearing; empathize with them (”Oh, I know……”); let them know your are listening. That’s how other women will know your are one of them.
Apply this skill especially if you are keeping your marriage together across your transition. Use the technique on your partner, starting today: “Yes…… Uh-huh….. Uh-huh…… Really!…..” as she talks about the kids (or the grandkids), or the house, or the party coming up next week. You are giving her reinforcement that you are present — here, now — and listening to her. Your attention is an assertion that she is a worthy, valuable person. She gets those strokes from her girlfriends; as you manifest the woman within you, make yourself a valuable friend by doing the girlfriend-things she’s used to.
Anyway, that’s how I chat. It’s a learnable skill, doesn’t take much practice, and greases the social wheels so nicely!
Posted in Being/staying married, Sex & Gender Roles, General MtF topics | 1 Comment »