More male fail, coming at me pretty regularly now.
The weekend of Nov. 2-3, I went to the Texas Ren Fest near Magnolia, Texas. I went with several friends, many from out of state, and one, a cisgender female who is one of my best friends who saw me Friday night and insisted that I've slid further across the gender continuum than I believed myself. I told her I wasn't planning to deliberately present female, just be my androgynous self. She said fine and that she would be sticking with me the entire weekend to count the number of times I was gendered female and gendered male.
Now what I wore were women's sneakers, which is what I usually wear, women's jeans, a gender neutral t-shirt Saturday, a feminine purple blouse Sunday, my hair down, my silver stud earrings Saturday and my favorite hoops Sunday, and my favorite feminine cap to cover the male pattern baldness on top. I admit to carrying a purse, just because I find them so darned handy. Oh, and I wore a white woman's sweater since it was cool both days, enough that short sleeves weren't quite comfortable. Now I've not done facial hair removal yet nor was I wearing any makeup. The facial hair removal starts in December at E3000. And while I've got the male resonance pretty much suppressed, I don't have much higher pitch because of the paralyzed vocal cords. And that was me going to the Ren Fest.
By the end of the day Sunday, when I was preparing to drive my friend back to the airport, she was having the last laugh. Over the course of two days, I'd been directly gendered female 17 times (Ms., Miss, Ma'am) and indirectly numerous others ("you ladies") and I'd been gendered male exactly 0 times. As we left the Fest walking back to the car, her only words, aside from a giant grin, were "Told ya!"
Then to ram the point home, twice this week when I was out and about not trying to present female at all, I was again gendered female.
I guess it must be getting obvious. For personal reasons, I'm sticking to my longer term plan to come out at work in late February or maybe early March (after annual evaluations are complete). I'll be doing the legal name and gender change in the second half of 2014, again for personal reasons, but given that I'll nearly be done with E3000 by late summer next year, I'm starting to feel really good about when I go full time.
Under other circumstances, I'd probably just move ahead now but things aren't that simple so I'll stick to my current timetable. But it's good to know that I'm starting to fit in and be accepted.
