I am really, really fed up with feminine trans women telling me that I'll be like them once I "grow up".
Seriously, it makes me want to break furniture.
I understand that everyone's got an investment in being the way they are (including me, obviously) - but I don't go around telling anyone else they ought to be like me. It feels like a conspiracy, like they're all reading from the same script. It's uncanny. And every time I get over the last one, another comes along like clockwork.
Why is it so hard to accept that there are so many different kinds of women out there, and some are not "feminine", not "womanly"?
I know, you've heard all this before from me. But seriously, it just keeps happening. AAArrrgghghgh!!!!! Saperlipopette !!!!
QuoteSaperlipopette !!!!
Umm...wut?
QuoteI am really, really fed up with feminine trans women telling me that I'll be like them once I "grow up".
Seriously, it makes me want to break furniture.
I understand that everyone's got an investment in being the way they are (including me, obviously)
Why is it so hard to accept that there are so many different kinds of women out there, and some are not "feminine", not "womanly"?
Because they see the "ideal" situation as one where one is uber-fem, shapely, no beard shadow, etc. They spent a lot of time and money (or...maybe not? Maybe they're naturally that way...) getting to where they are, and they A$$_U_ME that everyone would "of course" want to be like they are.
Kinda like the Peace Corps..."Of course" the whole world wants to be like the US...hey, let's go over there and help them! (We won't ask if they do, in fact, want the help...why would they say no? Everyone, I mean
everyone, wants to be like us Americans!)
I think the word "arrogance" may apply.
I don't know though. I'm rambling, it's late, I'm tired.
It's early here, and I'm tired (been up sneezing half the night...) hence the ire.
It's the feeling I'm being treated like a child that gets to me. I have a straight woman friend the same age as me who's always been a tomboy, and she says she constantly gets people telling her she hasn't "grown up", by which they mean "take on standard gender role now please".
It's so... I don't know whether there's a word for this - normist?
(Saperlipopette is a fantastic old French expletive which I only use on special occasions - I learned it from a Tintin book.)
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 03:25:22 AM
It's early here, and I'm tired (been up sneezing half the night...) hence the ire.
It's the feeling I'm being treated like a child that gets to me. I have a straight woman friend the same age as me who's always been a tomboy, and she says she constantly gets people telling her she hasn't "grown up", by which they mean "take on standard gender role now please".
It's so... I don't know whether there's a word for this - normist?
(Saperlipopette is a fantastic old French expletive which I only use on special occasions - I learned it from a Tintin book.)
Padma can you at least take comfort that you are seeing things clearly and they are not?
People who can appreciate diversity (in this case the many, many, many ways there are to be a trans woman) get a lot more out of life than people who have a rigid view of how things ought to be.
Can you take pity on these poor myopic souls? After all, they're stuck going through life like that.
Each time it happens, I slowly regain my equilibrium afterwards - until the next time.
It reminds me of smug christians assuming their belief is Reality, and constantly imposing it on me (I grew up Jewish, bisexual, and genderqueer in the UK, and put up with a lot of this) - it's got exactly that patronising "we are the default setting here" tone to it, and it pushes a load of buttons for me.
And each time it happens, I slowly regain my equilibrium afterwards.
But sometimes, I just need to bitch about it, okay? :)
Hum... firstly, HOW do you actually determine THOSE -feminine- women ARE what you think THEY are?
By their typing? By what they have to say?
Or truly by their presentation in real life and in your very presence? Sneeze!
Next, you do sound like some adolescents that like to believe they will NEVER grow up, never want to grow up!
Because all these grown-up folks are just not like they are themselves, adolescent - at that time in the life. Females growing up become women... butch, girly, womanly or otherwise – but women never the less.
Just be who you are at a time, and don't take things that are said too seriously.
Just saying...
Axx
Rant on sis. :-* If you grow up any more you won't fit in my screen. :laugh:
Thanks to my maternal granny apparently I am Jewish, so you aren't alone there. Aussies have a similar sense of humour too. Every silver lining has a cloud, type attitude.
I have finally sorted a lot of issues from my past and have ceased to identify men with the parts of my past I no longer identify with. I am now able to admit to finding men attractive, and frankly think I probably always have. Nobody ever mentioned Bisexuality or Transsexualism when I was young so it's no wonder I was doubly confused. I have a couple of close Bi friends so I have always been anti-Biphobe, bring it on I say!
As for being Genderqueer in the UK, I am tempted to ask isn't everyone over there? It certainly seemed that way last time I was in London. :o ::) ???
Cindy escaped before it became compulsory. >:-)
Karen.
But.... but Padma, I'm so fabulous! :-*
Anyone can be anything they like (including fabulous) so long as they're not telling me to be them.
It just seems to me that these women are saying "you'll only be a proper woman if..." - and that's so small-minded, and undermining, and unobservant of the reality of women's diversity.
Being told "it's just a phase you're going through" is insulting. I get over it each time, but then get told *exactly* the same thing over an over again, and it's wearisome.
Sounds like they are very insecure in their "femininity", so want to put you down to make themselves feel superior. If you are a real woman you don't have to keep proving it.
Maybe ask when they are going to have a BA?
Bitchy is as bitchy does. ;)
Or the direct approach, "Mind your own business!"
Quote from: Abracadabra on August 30, 2012, 05:23:26 AM
Hum... firstly, HOW do you actually determine THOSE -feminine- women ARE what you think THEY are?
By their typing? By what they have to say?
Or truly by their presentation in real life and in your very presence? Sneeze!
Apart from this last one (who was online), they've all been actual people actually sitting in front of me, tilting their heads condescendingly, telling me don't worry, I'll feel more like them once I've feminised more...
I'm open to the possibility of me changing as I transition - but they're only open to that possibility if I'm changing into
them, and there's a vast field of possibility out there that's not that, and which is way more appealing to me. I know I'm gradually growing up, but I'm gradually growing up into
me, and me is a big hippy dyke.
Obvious answer to their condescending statement, "Why would I want to do a stupid thing like that dear?"
I've only got such a cob on about it this time because it's a bit relentless and repetitive - and because my sinuses feel like they have salt & vinegar crisps stuffed up them. I'm off to get some painkillers and tissues (and chocolate). That'll sort me out :).
I vote for chocolate. Salt and Vinagre chips up my nose??? I vote nay. Femininty, well.... Anyone want to define that. Grrrr.... I don't mind a bit of femininity as long as there is a good deal of nerve and steel to go with it. As for hippy dykes, well that would be a perfect description for my partner and, yes, she is a big time tomboy. All I know is I vote for more hippy dykes, they are great. Especially, if they share their chocolate. ;D
You know I think the part of that I hated most was that I ended up feeling like I actually couldn't choose to be more feminine. That they'd see any slight movement in that direction as acceding to their perception of me. It made finding my own equilibrium even harder than it needed to be. I think the only thing that really fixes it is time. After a year, nobody hassles me much about my presentation anymore. And those that do, I've got enough balance now to ignore them.
Quote from: Beth Andrea on August 30, 2012, 03:12:15 AMBecause they see the "ideal" situation as one where one is uber-fem, shapely, no beard shadow, etc. They spent a lot of time and money (or...maybe not? Maybe they're naturally that way...) getting to where they are, and they A$$_U_ME that everyone would "of course" want to be like they are.
I just wanted to say that I have no beard shadow, I'm shapely, and I'm actually quite an attractive female. My masculine-of-center presentation doesn't make me ugly or something. I find that's kind of a... bad stereotype. That somehow the choice to not be feminine is related to conventional attractiveness. There are plenty of butch women who could rock an evening dress... they just don't want to.
And honestly, Padma, you look adorbs. And you look more adorable with each passing month. Maybe they're just thinking like... "I wish I had that to work with, why is she wasting herself like that, blah, blah." Envy can do weird things to peoples' brains.
Very sweet of you, Sarah :). Though I'm careful only to post headshots, that don't show my gawkish height...
Yes, the last face-to-face I had of this kind, the woman assumed I'd only just begun transitioning, because of my clothes ::). Like she was waiting for me to graduate into femininity.
I don't wear skirts, dresses, make-up because I don't like how I look in them, and because - mostly - I don't like how other women look in them. I probably wouldn't rock wearing them, because I'd look too uncomfortable, like Shane in that communion dress in The L Word (gods, I wish I looked like her!)
So I am myself quite judgmental about others' looks and outfits (who isn't!), but I don't do it out loud.
I had to leave a Tran* group elsewhere, I couldn't put up with the transsexual put downs and missrepresentation of an androgynous car ad from Japan.
I tried to explain that it wasn't, as one person put it, another use of a 'man in a dress', and his parts WE all despise are showing, and that HE doesn't even attempt to have boobs.
I tied to explain that the person doesn't, as written in the article, consider himself to be anything other than male, and does the makeup and look because he can do it. It's a job and he gets paid, ya know?
But the put downs and questioning of Androgyn's and other non-binaries continued. For quite a few posts.
So, I had enough of reading the line after line of ->-bleeped-<- from supposed supportive Trans*people, who as it turns out are just a bunch of transexuals claiming to support, yet also expressing a 'better than you' and we are the tru Trans* people attitude.
It is and will continue to be that way. Somebody needs to be thrown under the bus it seems.
And there will always be bigots no matter what group of people you look at.
Their ->-bleeped-<- doesn't stink, but then, neither does mine.
The amount of conflict in the Trans* world is appalling, and I am just as guilty...you could say.
But the fact of the matter is that we are not as outspoken about ourselves and at the time seem to be outnumbered.
I maintain that there are more of us, but who cares?
As long as we can be made to be the scapegoats of the 'man in a dress' problem that some have to endure, we will always be treated as nothing more than a way station on the way to eternal binary gender bliss.
Truth is,... the more that androgynous, androgyny, is accepted and portrayed in a positve light in the fashion world, the better off we will all be. It does help to get rid of the stereotype image of a 'man in a dress'.
But bigots will be bigots. They accept no other opinion but their own.
I'm just happy that the people I am friends with and would like to be friends with that are transsexuals were not among that bunch of people putting down another non-binary presentation, to justify their existence.
I've said as much before, in no uncertain terms here and it has had negative results.
I hope this, as a response to a distressed posting and topic, that it will not be so, again.
I have no ill will towards any Trans* person, just some of the ill informed viewpoints of some.
(no finger pointing here, it isn't needed.)
Ativan
far from being insecure in their feminity - actually femaleness - the people who annoy you are actually very secure and don't understand why someone would transition partly when its much nicer to transition fully.
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 10:31:26 AM
I don't wear skirts, dresses, make-up because I don't like how I look in them, and because - mostly - I don't like how other women look in them.
Actually, I think keeping your own counsel about what looks good on you and what doesn't, is VERY feminine.
I'm only just starting my exploration, but that is the type of woman I hope to be also.
Hugs to you and your independent thinking.
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 10:31:26 AM
Very sweet of you, Sarah :). Though I'm careful only to post headshots, that don't show my gawkish height...
Pfft, I'm 6' tall. Tall girls are hawt. No slouching! ;D
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 03:25:22 AM
(Saperlipopette is a fantastic old French expletive which I only use on special occasions - I learned it from a Tintin book.)
Fiddlesticks
Quote from: Ativan Prescribed on August 30, 2012, 11:00:01 AM
I had to leave a Tran* group elsewhere, I couldn't put up with the transsexual put downs and missrepresentation of an androgynous car ad from Japan.
I tried to explain that it wasn't, as one person put it, another use of a 'man in a dress', and his parts WE all despise are showing, and that HE doesn't even attempt to have boobs.
I tied to explain that the person doesn't, as written in the article, consider himself to be anything other than male, and does the makeup and look because he can do it. It's a job and he gets paid, ya know?
SNIP
Ativan
https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,125445.msg984705.html#msg984705 (https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,125445.msg984705.html#msg984705)
Padma,
I heard about how transwomen are not very accepting of us. I even experienced it on this website. It hurts. I don't know why so many of them, even high ranking people on this website are not understanding of us.
I guess that they really don't get us. For some reason they are ok with discriminating against us. It seems that they think that this is their space.
We have our own. We are comfortable with who we are. Maybe they have unresolved issues and they are unable to handle it so they project them onto you. That doesn't mean anything about you.
I don't think that they are right in doing that.
Well, I am a trans woman myself, it's just that when it comes to gender (as opposed to physiology) I'm pretty much androgyne.
These trans women I've been dealing with locally tried to fit me in a "gender-neutral" pigeonhole for a while (without me realising it), I think because they find it uncomfortable to have someone around who's ostensibly doing the same thing they are, but in a completely different way :). It's like they think I'm going to invalidate them, so they try to get in there first. There's a whole lot of peer pressure and subtle hierarchy going on (so it's basically just women stuff - well, men do this too, so I guess it's basically just people stuff), and they flock together and reinforce each other's "standard trans look and feel", and I don't fit in.
For some reason, they seem more at ease with me now that I've given them this Trans Tomboy/Hippy Dyke label to play with. They needed something to compare me to, and at least with these labels, the comparison is with other actual women.
I'm just going to ride the bumps while I get on with doing it my way. It'll be fine :).
Can't you just not hang out with them anymore? They don't seem to have the best influence on you. They aren't really being nice.
Quote from: lilacwoman on August 30, 2012, 02:05:30 PM
far from being insecure in their feminity - actually femaleness - the people who annoy you are actually very secure and don't understand why someone would transition partly when its much nicer to transition fully.
Well, this is hilariously redundant :). I'm transitioning fully into a different kind of woman from them, that's all that's unsettling them.
Quote from: lilacwoman on August 30, 2012, 02:05:30 PM
far from being insecure in their feminity - actually femaleness - the people who annoy you are actually very secure and don't understand why someone would transition partly when its much nicer to transition fully.
Why would I or any non-binary to want transition from one gender to the other when that is not who we are?
This is the classic kind of 'not self realized bigotry' that non-binaries have to listen to.
If you don't get that we are not binary and don't want to be, why make such comments like a full transition is the only way?
Non-binaries in general don't transition to a binary gender and don't have a binary gender to transition from.
We don't walk that same well worn path as a binary trans* person does.
We have our own. Why is this so hard to understand?
Comments like this, that full transition is much nicer, is a put down.
And you just don't get it. Non-binary people are a separate group.
Not an in between, not a place where binaries go when they transition.
From our point of view, who would want that? Trapped in a gender?
We are Trans* because we are in that place that has many variations, points that don't necessarily have to be and usually are not in that binary spectrum.
We are outside of that. Is it really that hard to understand?
Has society raised you in such a manner that you will still retain some of that bigotry towards someone you don't understand?
You experience it. Why then put that on someone else? How could that possibly be helpful to anyone?
Have you been told by non-binaries that transitioning is not the right thing to do? When it is. For you?
I have no problem talking about what I am doing with low dose HRT.
But it is something that I have carefully thought out and understand what I am doing.
I don't, and neither does any other non-binary, need to be told that it is the wrong way.
Just as your transition isn't anything that we have a right to tell you how you should be doing it.
Go ahead and ask questions, learn about us. But don't tell us what is right and wrong from a binary viewpoint.
Just like I don't and I doubt that any other non-binary would tell you how to transition.
I get it. We get it. It's because of all the information and documentation that is out there.
I can understand not being able to grasp the idea that we are something different, there is little information to use.
But first thing, you need to understand that there is a fundamental difference in how we live our lives.
Yep, we're Trans*. We move around in the ether world of genders, just like you do.
We just do it differently.
Ativan
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 03:25:22 AM
It's so... I don't know whether there's a word for this - normist?
Homogeneitist?
Gesundheit!
Yes, sigh. I'm not choosing to be the kind of woman I am, I'm just finally *getting* to be the kind of woman I am. It's not a "statement", it's merely reality.
The funny thing is, the more feminised my body gets (i.e. the closer to how I know it's meant to have been), and the more I arrive in myself - the more obvious it is that a hippy dyke is who I incontrovertibly am. So once I'm all the way there, I may be in doc martens (purple, natch) and get a crew cut :). Well, probably not, but the point is that the more confident I am in my femaleness, the more certain I am that I'm not a skirt-girl. I like boot-cut jeans and converse and waistcoats and satchels, is what I like. Oddly, this is kind of what I was like when I was a teen first time round - except that as a "boy", I apparently looked feminine that way, whereas now people want to call me butch :). Pff...
This is a great discussion! I am very grateful that Susan's has a strong contingent of androgynous-expressing or androgynous-identifying individuals. For me, it would get really stifling if it didn't.
I am a woman from a long line of very strong and very accomplished ciswomen, many of whom are distinctly androgynous or genderqueer. In fact, at this stage in my transition I am the most feminine-identifying and feminine-expressing woman in my entire extended family. I disagree vehemently with anyone who tells you that androgyny, whether in identity or expression, is "just a stage" or "not full transition" or any of the other bilgewater.
In my case, many of the wonderful women I most admire, passed through a stage of hyperfemininity like mine before they eventually grew up and grew into their marvelous unstereotypical womanhood. I don't know how I'll be or where I'll end up, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if this Madeline ends up squarely in the hippy-chick, tommyboi, rosie the riveter section of the gender universe.
Any time I hear someone maligning or talking down to androgynes it really gets to me, because they are insulting my mother, and my sisters, my father god rest his soul, and probably me some day if I ever "fully transition". Soldier on, my friends.
I'm not a 'stereotypical woman', I'm most comfortable in my converse, jeans and a tshirt, just like I always have - the styles and cuts are a little different now, but my basic 'uniform' remains the same. I do have the odd girly moment, but they are somewhat rare.
No point being a stereotype when you can live in surround sound and get the full experience.
Personally I will settle for transitioning to me, human. What I wear depends on the situation generally, although I simply like mascara, eyeliner, shadow and lippy. Whether I am in my bike leathers or a shirt. Because I like it!
As for "men in dresses", actually I think we will all agree that the world would be a better place if there were a lot more of it. David Tennent in a silk skirt? Hmmmm ;)
Karen.
I'd settle for seeing men in jeans that didn't resemble a sack of cement :). C'mon guys, where have those butts gone?
</objectify>
This is it - being yourself takes a while for people, because you have to filter out the cultural noise in order to tune in to the true signal. And I don't welcome people who add their own blare to try and drown out mine.
The fact that we have to say "I'm not x, I'm y" shows how pigeonholier-than-thou even the trans community can be sometimes. I've been surprised by how much people at large are willing to accept me as I am when I'm comfortable with me - and surprised by how often trans women are not willing to accept me. Conservatives are conservatives, gender regardless.
Quote from: Ativan Prescribed on August 30, 2012, 11:00:01 AM
missrepresentation of an androgynous car ad from Japan.
Well, it can be very confusing. The person in this ad looks and acts very feminine (
not effeminate that is, but natural feminine and elegant..) , completely natural and gorgeous at that.... but doesn't claim to be a woman (but would be completely credible if he did so).
He's not even TG but very feminine
by nature.
Yet he has to explain that he isn't TG or MTF but he's happy as a born man looking gorgeous and feminine at that.
Many MTF look and act and are very masculine
by nature and claim to be women. And have to explain that yes, despite their manly looks and (very) masculine behaviour they're women.
Like
QuoteI met a LtCol who saw combat as an helicopter pilot in Afghanistan. She earned a purple hart. She is a tall and beautiful woman, not the feminine kind, but a sexy nevertheless, self assured 21st century kind of woman.
That's a far cry from working as a (feminine looking AND acting) model in the fashion industry.
I think you need a (VERY) masculine nature AND very masculine looks to come as far like that in the army.
A feminine looking AND acting man wouldn't be taken seriously by his fellow soldiers and wouldn't come as far as becoming a LTCol.
AND it's
only within the MTF community she's considererd a 'sexy 21st century kind of woman'...most certainly NOT outside the MTF community because
no one understands.
On the other hand the androgynos, gorgeously feminine looking AND acting model 'runs a risk' being seen by the community in general as a 'sexy, 21st century kind of woman'
because of his looks and behaviour.
But he isn't a woman, nor a TG, but a born man.
It's not 'misrepresentation' it's how someone is by nature.
Quote from: Padma on August 31, 2012, 02:12:36 AM
This is it - being yourself takes a while for people, because you have to filter out the cultural noise in order to tune in to the true signal. And I don't welcome people who add their own blare to try and drown out mine.
Speaking of blare... that made me consider posting the vid of
Things Can Only Get Better by D:Ream. But then I remembered that people actually have ears. And taste.
I have no taste currently - I have a cold. You can pm it me ;D.
One can only be oneself. To be something else causes one to cease to be, in place of someone new. Such an act could be seen as murder, provided one's mind is poetic enough.
... So, as long as causing the cessation of existence of an individual is murder's definition, I would say that it would be a crime for one to be anything other than one's own person. To be oneself might be a horrible thing to some people, and many may object to this person, but if they advocate for this person to be something other than themselves, then they are in the wrong, because that would be promoting a killing.
Hopefully that came out as silly as I wanted it to. :)
So if you let people tell you who you should be, it's suicide :).
Exactly right!
My other self is denying that they are trying to kill me, therefore preventing suicide by murder. ;D
(I really am just one person, however wrong that person may be.)
This is something that I copied a couple years ago, from an Emerald post.
It has serve me well to have it on my desktop.
(Right there with the other things a crazy person puts on their desktop.)
Gender has no meaning or value if it is counterfeit.
Counterfeit gender is just a game, a trick, an amusement,
an act, a fraud, a deception, an imitation, artificial, bogus.
Be yourself, not a gender.
Being yourself is effortless and genuine.
Being yourself is REAL, not counterfeit.
In being yourself, in behaving in a manner which is natural to you,
whatever gender you are becomes self-evident.
-Emerald
Humbly,
Ativan
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 02:57:56 AM
I am really, really fed up with feminine trans women telling me that I'll be like them once I "grow up".
Seriously, it makes me want to break furniture.
I understand that everyone's got an investment in being the way they are (including me, obviously) - but I don't go around telling anyone else they ought to be like me. It feels like a conspiracy, like they're all reading from the same script. It's uncanny. And every time I get over the last one, another comes along like clockwork.
Why is it so hard to accept that there are so many different kinds of women out there, and some are not "feminine", not "womanly"?
I know, you've heard all this before from me. But seriously, it just keeps happening. AAArrrgghghgh!!!!! Saperlipopette !!!!
I totally understand what you mean. It is so frustrating when people simply assume or demand you must look like this or that. I have always thought that one of the points of all this is so show people that not everybody is the same. I do alot of educational lectures about transgender in Iceland, and one of the things I've encountered is that people don't often get the fact that transpeople, just like everybody else, are just as varied and different. In a world filled with so much diversity, why do people always insist on that people have to be one way or another?
I completely understand your frustration, I cannot even begin to describe how much this annoys me.
Yeah, but it's a great excuse to eat shedloads of garlic :).
Garlic?
I'd turn into a bat and fly away.
I've turned into a cricket bat, and I'm just lying here.
It's just (a) good for colds, (b) the only thing I can actually taste, and (c) bloody delicious :).
We have a pizza place here that serves a marinara pie rumoured to cure any cold.
Well, I'm still awake at 1.30 sneezing my head off (and occasionally wiping down the sneezed-up screen of my ereader - ecch...) - I'm reading this brilliant book called Circle of Change, kind of a young adult book about paganism/Wicca and the getting together of a young gay guy with a young trans man. It's very funny, and very, very sweet. A good book to be reading on a full moon night ;D. I love the queerness of my genderqueerness :).
*thoroughly over excited update*
I've just had a really major flash of insight: I'm transitioning to end my gender dysphoria (because my body not being female has always been the wrong thing) - but I'm not transitioning in order to stop being genderqueer. My dysphoria and my genderqueerness are two completely separate entities, and fundamentally, what I am and will remain is a genderqueer woman.
So there's no paradox or conflict in me. I deeply love that I'm transitioning - and I love that I'm a female, a woman, who identifies as a tomboy, as womandrogyne, as androgyne, who fancies women and men (both cis and trans)* and people whose gender I don't even know. I love that in some way (for which I have, and need, no explanation), there's a corner of my genderqueer identity that feels like a trans man.
None of this is either/or, it's all going on at once, it's all me, and it's all good.
Realising this is incredibly freeing. I feel really, really happy right now.
Sleep? Pff... :D
*unconscious homage à e.e. cummings - I love my unconscious!
Great Emerald quote, Ativan.
Great Epiphany, Padma.
I'm an epiphyte - I learn from trees :).
Still awake, 4.30, oh boy...
Quote from: Padma on August 31, 2012, 10:33:08 PM
I'm an epiphyte - I learn from trees :).
Still awake, 4.30, oh boy...
You should come to Oregon. It's only 8:38 pm here. You'll get lots more sleep that way.
One of many time zones I've yet to visit. Oh, wait, I've been to Denver, that just counts :). It's now 10 in the morning and I just woke up still full of snot but also full of happy. A poem I share for a Saturday:
the voices of the hearts of trees
have this to say:
grow... but grow slowly
grow slowly... but grow
Quote from: Padma on August 30, 2012, 03:25:22 AM
It's early here, and I'm tired (been up sneezing half the night...) hence the ire.
It's the feeling I'm being treated like a child that gets to me. I have a straight woman friend the same age as me who's always been a tomboy, and she says she constantly gets people telling her she hasn't "grown up", by which they mean "take on standard gender role now please".
It's so... I don't know whether there's a word for this - normist?
(Saperlipopette is a fantastic old French expletive which I only use on special occasions - I learned it from a Tintin book.)
I just came to the realization that when I'm forced to interact with a group of females (with at least a few that know me), they often all do this thing where they go out of their way to try to "feminize" me. Throughout my whole life this has happened. And I've realized how angry this really makes me.