CDSL: Cross Dressing as a Second Language

There are a small number of people in the world who simply never put a foot wrong or wander off-key in matters of appearance, and you may have met one or two in your life. My 8th grade English teacher was one such person. A polished platinum sophisticate, and a woman of means, to use the old fashioned expression, she drove the vintage Corvette or the snazzy Bricklin when the weather was fine, and a stately Jaguar saloon when it wasn’t. She wore a different dress every day, reputedly shipped home by the container load from upmarket Parisian salons after her twice yearly shopping pilgrimages.

She was a superb and dedicated teacher, but even if she had been inept, I don’t suspect that anyone in the administration could have taken her to task. Mrs. H. appeared always to be perfect, never a wrinkle, an errant thread or a bead of sweat. Hard to argue with that sort of competency. It is a rare gift.

I never had that gift. I did however have enough self-consciousness and insecurity in my teen years to put real thought into what cloths said about me. I funded my college education in part by selling clothes in retail settings. This formal and paid education stood me in good stead in my later professional life, in an era when we wore suits, and wearing them well did actually open doors.

My hard won talent for dapper is a bit of a relic now, a social appendix in our khaki-ocratic era of office casual, but the reflexes are still put to good use. I know what to buy, where to find it, how to put a value on it, and where to wear it. Getting ready for the day, or for a night in guy-mode is a simple exercise, and I never feel like I have it wrong.

It is different for the Cross Dresser is it not? The woman’s wardrobe is not the wardrobe of my birth and formative years. When I dress en femme, all the reflexive ease of the day-to-day routine is gone, and nothing comes “thoughtlessly”. As such, being dressed requires a laborious sort of translation. It feels like the same sort of process I go attempting to form sentences in French. Verb forms, sentence structure, subject/object relationships, etc, all assembled awkwardly under the ticking stopwatch of social acceptability. This is similar I imagine to what people speaking in an acquired language go through every day, with every utterance. What the ESL speaker loses in translation sometimes simply sounds adorable, but here and there, something gets so fully mangled that everyone is left dumbfounded. So it is with the CDSL student.

The translations start in the shops, online and real world. Assortments are bigger by a factor of 10. Sizes mystify, sleeve and skirt lengths confound, colors dazzle and seasons are sensitive. Prices run from the unjustifiably high to the criminally low.

On the odd chance that I find something I like, don’t already own, and can afford, and is on the racks in my size range, I am now looking at a 1 in 5 shot of it fitting well and looking good. Assume for a moment that it does fit and look well, we are still not quite there yet. I probably don’t have the right coat for a skirt of that length, or the coat I do have is too dressy for the rest of the ensemble. Oh, yeah, the rest of the ensemble, not quite so easily assembled is it? The blouse, is this the right neckline for the look? the right fabric for the season? a good shade for my complexion? Repeat the process. Accessories? Shoes, same again, and then, what about the bag?

After all of this, the Cross Dresser still earnestly scrambling up the learning curve discovers that women are held to a much higher standards of setting and age appropriateness than men are. This has a real limiting impact on those few outfits that we do get right. This looks great, but too much leg for daylight. Love that, but you can’t wear it shopping because it will rip your wig off in the fitting room. The sandals look and feel great but dammit its close to freezing and far from April. Make up, am I going to be seen under fluorescent lights or through candlelight? Jewelry? If Ithe piece looks and feels right, the likelihood is that I cannot find and operate the clasp. It is all a little dizzying.

Social commentator Malcolm Gladwell refers to a concept he calls the 10,000 Hour Rule in his recent book Outliers. Here is a grotesque reduction of the concept: do anything for 10,000 hours and you will be good at it, perhaps great. If the Beatles did not play 8 hours a night in Hamburg in their formative years, they would not have had a chance to get good enough to have given us Rubber Soul or Abbey Road (ed. hey, youngish readers …, it is true that your parents may have been insane, but in matters of music they do know more than you).

10,000 hours of Cross Dressing is not in my future, unless I become one of those Cryogenic cranks and am reanimated a century or two down the road in a liberal-minded and fashion obsessed society where my money still has value. And so I am consigned, like many, to putting the wrong foot forward and hitting off key notes along the way. It is a reality that the woman’s wardrobe will remain a Second Language for me.

This is not all bad, and I do want to underline one of the really good things that goes along with this reality. Cross Dressing, as comforting as it is, takes me out of my comfort zone. Getting out of the comfort zone helps me connect with that younger person within, the younger person who spent more time out of the zone than in. Not quite so young a person as the kid with the epic yearnings for Mrs. H, but a younger person than my age indicates. I enjoy that perspective. How about you?

Happy Valentines Day to you, and to those that love you.

(image credit: www.anntaylor.com)

Petra’s Pantyhose Parade, Round 3: High Waisted L’eggs

When last we spoke, dear friends, about this brace of bustline brushing tights, two winners had emerged from the preliminaries and one fierce intra-corporate battle was left. To recap, Donna Karan emerged triumphant in the Ivy League Basketball tip off with Ann Taylor in Round 1. Assets by Sara Blakely had aced big sister Spanx in the courtly Round 2 Tennis showdown. Here now, with mere hours remaining before the lighting of the Torch in a beautiful and oddly snow free Vancouver, I will shift sports metaphor to the Olympic arena.

Curling is the game this week, largely on the strength of it being the only Olympic sport outside of figure skating for which some of the ladies still wear a skirt. Not so often these days as in olden tymes, and how sad this is with such a terrific array of leggings on the market. More typical gear is pictured here. At least a fashion effort is being made. Curling additionally has the benefit of a score keeping model which cannot be corrupted, which is something I like to hold myself to. The battle (bonspiel for you ice geeks out there) is a short, alternating shot 4 throw sprint to the finish, complete with the required breathless play-by-play commentary.

Our last hopeful, fresh-faced competitors in this fierce fashion fight-out are products from perennial hosiery powerhouse L’eggs, and represent the NCAA (Nice, Cheap, All-American) Conference. L’eggs today fields entries from two distinct lines, with legacy product Silken Mist Waist Cinching Shaper and the recently launched Profiles Waist Smoother Toner leg wrestling for final round privileges.

Gone, sadly, long gone is the terrific packaging of yesteryear that was the L’eggs brand signature, but their position as mass merchant of well made, value priced hosiery remains practically unchallenged. As with the Sara Blakely products, there is a great deal of shared DNA in these sheers. The toe (sandal foot) and waistband construction (silicon gripper) are identical, as is the price of $8.00 at your neighborhood drug store. Predictably though, as with any offspring of the same parents, a few stylistic and behavioral differences emerge in a desperate sibling grab for differentiation.

Lets see how they fare ...

Round 1 – Compression: The Silken Mist have a uniform stretch panty that distributes errant body mass evenly, but not drastically. The Profiles field a much more robust elastic-rich panty portion with an amazing 37% Spandex content, replete with additional belly and booty panels. Additionally, the reinforced thigh slimming component covers a full 4” more leg than the Silken Mist, again distributing upper leg flesh more evenly and comfortably. Profiles are left alone in the scoring house with a 1 point advantage.

Round 2 – The Battle with Gravity: The Profiles curl first with their slender lead, but all of their stretchy armament leaves them too, too prone to gradual southbound migration under their own matte mass, missing the house entirely. Silken Mist, not so much burdened by structure, stays higher, longer on the torso, and knocks the earlier Profiles stone out of the house. Silken Mist has the house alone, with a stone in the half-point outer ring, taking the barest of leads.

Round 3 - Finish and Appearance. Both of these rise to the moment and put their best feet forward. Truly, for the price, they both look terrific. Very even matte finishes, with the silky hand feel of much costlier and haughtier products. Not a showy legging, perfectly suitable for daytime and professional settings. Even with a practically unnatural 20% Spandex leg content (with Silken Mist @ 15%), the Profiles possess a softness and breathability that surprises. They show just a little less of the tell-tale run resistant threading of the Silken Mist entry too though, and as such gain back the half point, knocking Silken Mist out of the house, and clinging to the ring. The match is drawn.

Round 4 – Petra Points. These points are not quite so arbitrary as those rendered from nowhere by French Figure Skating judges, but they are grounded in inherently mushy subjective considerations, on matters that are difficult to quantify. Here, with things deadlocked, I claim editorial privilege to pick the winner. These tights both promise to shape the torso, slim the thigh and shine the leg, and both do it well. In this game of inches and ounces, I believe that the Profiles threw a final round bonspiel winning stone. At the end of the match, they emerge, by a gossamer margin over the Silken Mist.

A tip of the pillbox cap with gloved hand to the nice people at L’eggs for making a terrific line of products here in the good old US of A that can help a big girl on a budget look like a slender one who isn’t. For the concluding entry of this (admittedly odd) series, I will invite all the high-steppin’ competitors back, line up the scores from tip-top to buff-bottom, and generally wax (opinion-wise, not Brazilian-wise) on the merits and demerits of high-waisted hosiery.

Happy dressing in the meantime.

Seven Deadly Cross Dressing Sins – Buy One, Get 2 Free

Our litany of transgressions against the Seven Deadly Sins started here and here with your Cross Dressing Correspondent sloppily gorging on the low hanging forbidden fruits of Vanity and Envy. Easy stuff really. Very distinct, very universal, and very human failings. Not too too difficult for a writer to ponder, process, and pass such behavioral pits. The garden gets thornier the further one wades in though.

In fact, one begins to wonder about the whole original Seven Sins Project. You would think if something was truly deadly, that you could identify very clean lines and red flags, but I find it difficult to tease the knots out of Avarice, Gluttony and Lust. The original authors of this curious manifesto could just as easily gone for a Forsaken Four or, perhaps, a Fatal Five Sins. Somewhere in The Vatican Archives I am quite certain there is a memo from the Cardinal in charge of Marketing to his cross-functional project team along these lines:

Team: With agreement reached on the Key Performance Indicators for the Deadly Sins Program in our weekly Team Status Update and Planning Session, we are golden. Time now to drive the project over the finish line. To proceed, we need a final count of Deadly Sins. I am pulling rank and setting the bar for you here. We are going to launch with 7 “Deadly Sins”.

7 makes sense from a messaging and merchandising perspective. With 7 Sins, we can rotate new creative in daily, and really habituate the faithful to the idea of feeling poorly about themselves every day, and not just Sundays. This should support top line revenue objectives and help us maintain our admirable market share position (take that Buddha! LOL!).

I realize this will take some real creativity from all of you to drive from five to seven, but you are the best in the business, and I have no doubt that you can pull it off. I am so confident in fact that I promised 7 Sins, and brought the launch date forward by 2 weeks in a meeting with the other Big Hats here at HQ this morning. The pushy Spanish Cardinal with the bonfires and thumbscrews is taking too much damned air out of the room. This’ll shut him up for a while.

Get cranking on it team! The masses just can’t get too much of our brand of despair.

Warm regards, etc…

This memo of course caused shrieks of disbelief and snapped feather quills around the conference room table. A very quick solution was proposed by a junior Deacon, name lost to history, who scrambled up to the white board and sketched out a solution looking something like this: (click to expand). By splitting Greed into 3 subgroups, magico-presto, 7 Deadlies, done, out of here, and ready for Casual Friday!

Seriously, think about it a moment:

Avarice: Greed for material things. An inordinate, miserly desire to gain and hoard wealth.
Gluttony: Greed of the Appetite. Excessive eating and drinking.
Lust: Greed of the Flesh. A passionate or overmastering desire or craving for bodily fulfillment,

Do you see a common thread? Impulse control, really.

Now you know I like a quick fix as much as the next gal (yeah, yeah, yeah, I am getting around to Sloth, o I don’t know, next week … I suppose), and so today I am reconsolidating these sins back into their original and correct Greed uber-group.

Avarice I will claim. Guilty as charged. I do like a nice little trip to the shops. With me out of the closet, I have found more room in said closet for material things, cottons, wools and silks yes, and a pretty rich variety of lycra reinforced elastic materials too. And shoes. Did I mention shoes?

I am not crazed about the accumulation of things in general. My attitude about lucre is healthy: my creditors seem to be more greedy about my money than I am. Typically, I am disciplined about weighing the merits of purchases. Want vs. Need is a part of my daily marketplace calculus.

Having kept Petra pretty deep in the shadows for so long though, I have indulged material urges pretty well of late, making up for lost time. Great bargains along the way, but it is well past time to start posing the Want vs. Need question in Petra mode a little more habitually. I have a nice wardrobe, and I maintain clothes well. I should simply change up the accessories to keep things fresh.

I have only on one occasion repeated an outfit in a social setting. I have garments that I have not yet worn. I have a couple of things that I may never wear. This, to my thinking is not quite right. I am going take those things that I will not wear, and find them a new home for them with someone who will.

Gluttony. Not too much of an issue here. I eat 3 times daily, and my metabolism eats 4. Feelings of satiety come naturally to me, en femme and in drab. The feeling of being truly full pleaseth me not. Now and then I get a funny look for leaving food on the plate, and for years my response has been that Waste is not a deadly sin. Gluttony is. I would rather leave value out than try to cram it in. And beyond the health considerations, quite seriously, being relatively slender is a plus for the Cross Dresser.

On the other hand though, not having pockets available to me en femme, I sometimes lack certainty about what exactly to do with my hands. If there is a glass of wine nearby, it seems too easy, too natural to pick it up, take a sip, notice the curious stamp of lipstick, put the glass down, and repeat as required. I am a bundle of nerves and sensations when dressed, becalmed in part, but also really attenuated. A good amount of current runs through me in these happy hours. I should (will) work at being a little more "still", in the moment, and a little less herky-jerky about the beverage at my elbow.

Lust. I have confessed in prior posts to having a more fetishy approach to Cross Dressing in my youth. This season seems to have passed for me. The lions share of this change I believe goes to the welcome that I have provided to my desires to explore our phenomenom fully. With permission granted to myself to better understand this somewhat vexing aspect of my life, I am at peace. My old Furies leave me alone. And so do I.

A part of this change goes to time too. The chronological odometer takes a bite out of our potential for Lust, or at least for the impulse to act upon it. In this matter though, with the natural waning of Lust that is attendant upon time, a little extra care and cultivation of her better natured partner, Passion is required. Lust sinks her teeth in and drags one about. Passion is summoned from within. If we are not victims of Lust, we must be authors of Passion. I will work on being a better author.

Five down, two to go. Again, as in prior posts, I commend to you the wonderful artwork of Marta Dahlig. I am not sure that I would have pushed this theme quite so far without her imagery to better merchandise the odd firings of my brain. Clearly if you have read this far, you have her to thank in part, and are not guilty of Sloth. And now that you have come this far, I do hope to not have stirred up any Wrath..

I am saving all of that for future posts.

Happy sin-free dressing, and everything else….

Southern Comfort

Mrs. Bellejambes and myself have had an awful lot going on lately, and as all consuming as the smoldering tire-dump fire of Cross Dressing can be, its flames have not licked too too closely to home. “Petra” has been the girl in the room that we both know is there, yes, but we have been polite and/or patient enough to not aggressively engage her. Additionally, neither of us really have a nicely indexed Operators Manual for this whole thing, so we have not fully grasped this nettle, so to speak. Circumstances recently allowed for a circumspect how-do-you-do last night though. Allow me to share.

I received a note a little while back from Giselle at Pink Essence advertising a planning session / social gathering wrapped around the 2010 Southern Comfort Conference and throwing out an invite to all so inclined. Another Angel of Mercy, JoAnn, who I met this past December at a local Yahoo! T-Girls chapter booze-up reached out too. JoAnn, and her superbly supportive wife, Cyndi, expressed a real hope that I might introduce my superbly supportive wife to the sorority. Mrs. B welcomed the opportunity for us to both present, and learn what we could.

There were some logistical issues in so far as we also had an invitation to a birthday gathering for a friend. Mrs. B suggested we do both events en femme, and do you know, I very seriously considered really going out there. Our friend, and her social circle would have not have been freaked out or put off by the presence of a Cross Dresser. Very liberal set, creative, artsy, and even supportive of heterosexual people too. Broad minded indeed, and the birthday girl herself usually does have broads on the mind. The setting for the party was a completely beautiful lounge room at a grand hotel here in Atlanta, the sort of room I am sure to have run a tab in in a past life.

“Seriously honey, we can just say that we are going to a costume party”, said my wife …

Perhaps with a Carmen Miranda pile of fruit on my head we could pull off the costume party thing. Technically, whatever we wear is a costume, but presenting en femme is a very real thing for me. No-one who meets “Petra” could believe for a moment that my appearance is a one-off, just-for-fun thing. So no, not just now. I am not yet ready to link the known me with the less well known. The thought is out there though now, yes? Very complex and compelling calculus associated with that move that we together will want to put some real thought to in the not too distant future.

The Southern Comfort Conference is a feather boa of an entirely different shade though. This annual, three day TG/CD confab has been gathering steam without any help from me for 20 years now. I toyed with the idea of attending last year, but not being out at home, and with the sad flooding of said home that week, hopes were derailed. SCC is a big event, bigger each year, requiring a good amount of plotting and planning. Committee chairs, content providers and other helpful types spent the long Saturday working out the details and planned to reward themselves and provide comfort to others after the labors with a little party.

Mrs. B dropped me off at the Crown Plaza just before 8 with the promise to return when the happy duties were done at the vaguely more straight mid-town event she pulled duty for. The smart doorman saluted and held doors for the girl in the lace skirt, short coat, dark sheers and killer pumps, and having a few minutes to spare I thought to sit for a quick bracer in the lobby bar just to get my bearings.

Miss Kitty, Christie, Leslie and Paige welcomed a 5th wheel to the table, confirming for me that I was clearly visiting the correct Crown Plaza. Leslie had handed me a drubbing at a pool table some time ago, so it was sweet to see a familiar face. Paige was introduced as visiting from my hometown, which is more than a couple of counties away from Dixie. Naturally I took soundings about where exactly she lives and breaths, and about this I am not joking: Paige lives today 50 yards down the road from my very first address, way back in the mists of time. Tiny old world.

The party was busy and getting busier by the moment as we and the gathering crowd flocked in. JoAnn introduced me to a few of the ranking officers. I gave assurances to Cyndi that, yes, Mrs. B would be attending presently, hopefully, necessarily in part because I had the wrong shoes for the long walk home.

I happily lost every bit of self consciousness engaging in small talk with a tall beauty hailing from Cocoa Beach. When one meets someone from Cocoa, one presumes, correctly often, that one is in the presence of a rocket scientist. Lift-off, genuine stuff, and years later still electrified by the work of exploding people into outer space and returning them safely to our tiny blue orb. I am an Apollo child and a freak for this stuff. Lost her name in all my excitement, I am a cad too.

Lexie, Verna, Lida and too many to recall helped me enjoy the evening very nicely. At peak I would guess the room to have housed 30 or so people, transitioned, transitioning, transmasculine, transmaried and just generally making the trans run on time. Leda, in from Boston told the tale of getting called out at Logan for the odd contents of her carry on bags. The breast forms it seemed drew some x-ray attention and caused a degree of mortification on the way through to the boarding gate. That would be a moment not soon forgotten no doubt.

I am a bit of a recluse, and usually a little suspicious of people with whom I have a lot in common. I really have not felt much of a need to seek out the company of fellow Cross Dressers. I have always had strong convictions that I am not alone in my habits, and so do not need a heap of validation on that front. But it is nice, and therapeutic to share time with nice normal people in an easy social setting.

Mrs. B is a bit more naturally sociable and engaging then I am though, and threw herself nicely into the pool upon arrival a couple of hours and a few glasses of wine later. She really is magnetic, and as flawed a husband as I am, I am never not proud of her. There is no artifice in her, completely open and available to the person whose attention she has. Attention comes easily too, she stands out in any room and it doesn’t take people long to figure that the beauty is much more than skin deep. Tory engaged her in a long chat about Greg Mortenson, a real hero to my wife. Tory volunteers her time and energy to supplying Mr. Mortenson’s foundation with pencils and other tools of literacy which really captured Mrs. B’s enthusiasm.

I peeled off while Cyndi and my wife had a more private commiseration about the complexities of marriage in general, and the specific complexities of being married to the likes of, well, the likes of me. I believe it was a good evening for all. We still have our complexities, but seem to have the wherewithal to tame and tend to them.

I believe a special, awesome bravery required to be “out”. I am not out. I camouflage with clothing, conceal with cosmetics and call myself by a different name. There is no public linkage between my halves. My wife went commando. She is out. I hope to join her some happy day.

Have a Super Sunday. Go Saints.

The Seven Deadly Sins of Cross Dressing – Envy

Well friends, the first post in this series generated some interesting comments, and a couple of private notes from friends. Feedback from readers is really helpful, truly. Nobody writes well in a vacuum. Here is another thing about vacuums: they do not tidy up messy wrting. So allow me to tidy up the last post here quickly before wading into the briny green sea of Envy, our Deadly Sin de Jour.

I do not feel guilty of any "sins" relative to Cross Dressing. I am far too accomplished a lapsed Catholic to feel the burdens of sin. I will cop to a fashion crime here and there, yes, but no sins as such.

Good and bad things exist on continuums, and there are lots of grey shades between the extremes. I believe it is important to think, every now and then, about where on the important continuums (ed. continua?) you stand. Here, I am employing the traditional “7 Deadlies” as a triage kit for the exercise – not as a platform of self-recrimination. Plus I found those pretty Marta Dahlig pictures and feel compelled to merchandise them.

Be assured that I will not, ever, stop attempting to look my best, in guy mode and otherwise. To the extent that I can, I want to be attractive in appearance. Who doesn’t after all? Moreover, I will happily lap up the encouraging words that come my way, and try to remember to thank their bearers. I will not hesitate to take the odd photo and share it with you here. Poor a camera technician as I am, I can typically get a good picture quicker than a thousand good words.

I am just going to try to contain my focus on those things, and make sure that the Majorette at the front of my parade is not Vanity herself. I was drawn early to Cross Dressing, and enjoy it greatly today largely because it just feels right. If I keep Vanity in check, it will feel more right. If I do not, it might feel less right. That would be a bad outcome.

The defense rests. So there. Moving on now to Envy:

A feeling of covetousness with regard to another's advantages, success, possessions, etc.

Hmmm. Envy has been a central motivator for me in my explorations, from the very beginning. I envied girls, and then women all of the private rituals of becoming womanly, the hooks and eyes, the fabrics and fragrances, the buckles and bows. the whole beguiling shooting works. I envied too, the impact that a confident, attractive women has, simply walking into a room, that special kind of notice that a guy cannot hope to have. Frailties and powers much different than the ones I could claim.

Envy for me, like Vanity, employed a looking glass, but rather than vainly gazing back at my own image, the looking glass revealed, Alice-like, a forbidden wonderland just out of reach.

Investigating the nature of Envy a little, I came across a Spanish proverb that I rather liked. The Spanish have my attention for starters, all those nice lacey scarves, flamenco skirts, and strappy heels, yumm, so this one hit home:

Envy is thin because it bites, but never eats.

Well I suffered bites for years, decades really. Now though, having come to peace with myself, and having shared my habit with Mrs. Bellejambes, I am able to eat, if you will. Envy has been disarmed, not entirely, but largely disarmed.

I still have periodic green flashes about the limits of my presentation en femme. I require long sleeves, skinny as my arms are, they are far too well defined and hair-thatched to enlist with the Little Black Dress Brigade. No plunging necklines either, my sorcery, my gal-chemy is not potent enough to summon up cleavage. Absent the cleavage, there is very little to take the focus off my jaw-line which demands too comprehensive a plastering of Dermablend Concealer to obscure imperfections of complexion, tell-tale shadows and what not. The end effect of the makeup is good, but the effect is visible, which moots part of the art of makeup. So the bites are there still, but they do not draw blood.

Envy extends, now and then, to brief flights of imagination, a periodic wish to pass fully through the looking glass, and live for brief interludes as an unquestionably and therefore unenvying member of the fair sorority. And then, to return on demand to my largely happy life in Drabistan. Envy is a relative trifle now, tamed, and more sweet than bitter.

It is pretty, and pretty tempting on the other side of the looking glass, but there is plenty of wonder in my more commonly occupied land, if I but manage to look at things fully. With that thought, here is a nice word from 19th century American philosopher/wag Josh Billings on the topic:

Love looks through a telescope: envy, through a microscope.

Here is to the bigger picture, friends.

2 “Sins” down, 5 to go, if I stay at it. I must tell you though, as much as I want to feature more of the beautiful work of Marta Dahlig I am not sure I will. Truth be told, my imagining of a nice series of essays has, shall we say, not tucked quite so smoothly as I had hoped. I am sensing unsightly bulges in the editorial fabric not quite becoming of a modest and earnest scribe. If I can smooth them out, I will continue, but I promise not to hurt either of us in the process.

There will be other things to ruminate on after all. Mrs. B and myself are taking an evening on the town together tomorrow night for example. I hope to learn a thing or two that can be discreetly shared with you here. Stay tuned.