Season's Greetings from the DemiMonde

When one has a social life which has a significant component of leisure activities with BDSM people, and crossdresser's of every stripe and ruffle, then the holiday's are experienced like you were the "other woman" again and again and again. Many of my closest acquaintances have another life in what is usually called the vanilla world as do I. (And what flavor is this world? tutti frutti?) So come the holidays, everyone disappears, only to re-appear in January with all new outfits!
"Come on. I know your wife didn't give you that. Shopping for dresses again under cover of Christmas?"

And so to all the orphans out there, the penthouse mistresses, the girls who just put their the weekend wardrobes in the back of the closet. Have a very Merry Christmas, and hope to see you in the New Year.

Ten Signs You are No Longer a Casual Crossdresser

"Everything was fine until they crossed the Macon County Line"

---- promotion for movie of the same name

As a service to the community,

Are you wondering whether your proclivities and obsessions for the female appearance and the female role have reached a tipping point? If so, look at the ten signs below. If you recognize yourself in more than 4 of the signs, then you can be assured that you are no longer a casual crossdresser. You have seriously crossed over sweety, and you might as well stock up on the Dr. Scholls, because those heels are going to punish your feet.

Here they are

1) You can't remember where your tool box is. Your garter belts are in the second drawer of the dresser in the spare room.

2) Its Christmas and the catalogs are coming in. Your mailbox resembles that of a french whore house.

3 ) You couldn't name a single network program. but have seen every episode of Say Yes to the Dress? Friday Night, TLC

4) You no longer have a few articles of female clothing, in fact it has been a while since a majority of your clothes were male. If your wardrobe was an ecology, and if your togs were species, then I believe the word used is supplanted.

5) The waitress at the diner says " thank you sir" You check the mirror. Have I messed up? No silly you are in male mode.

6) You think of yourself as in male mode.

7) A couple of women in the office are talking about the Sex and the City dresses how great Vivian Westwood's dresses are. You want to blurt out, What about Alexander McQueen?

8) It is Christmas, when its safe to shop for clothes in the department stores. You still take advantage of that, but this time you bought 3 bras, and they didn't ask you if you wanted them gift wrapped.

9) You missed the football games last sunday, because there was a luncheon party , and you were seen in that ecru silk dress. I mean it is not only silk, it is beaded. bugle beads!

10) That lovely young woman sitting across from you. You still wish you could see through that blouse.... and check out the tag. Is that Forever 21 or Charlotte Russe?

These are events collected from my own and the lives of a few friends.

They know who they are.

Leela

"Put on a gown that touches the ground

"Float on a river forever and ever" "

Pink Floyd

And why does Devi choose to cause a universe of befuddlement, a universe that includes gender confused along with all those other poor confused souls etc.   The devotees of the Goddess say  Leela, sanskrit for playful enjoyment.  I love that concept.    the religion of my fathers was one where we asked, why did God make us.... and were diligently drilled in the answer,

"God made us to show forth his goodness, and to share with us his everlasting happiness in heaven. " but actually in the day to day... it seemed more like a trial.. and the consequences of disappointing Him...well... they were sort of extreme.

So on the chinese menu of religion I choose one from column B... Leela.

It is just the loveliest idea. And I think if I can align my issues with the grand play MahaLeela

And what better way than a gown that touches the ground. It worked for Emily.

Gender Queery

Didn't the Barbarians put it best at the dawn of time...."Are you a boy? or Are you a girl?

Someone will answer the question, not necessarily you,and then... Then you know what bathrom to use. but when the question is "Am i a boy? or Am I a girl? then the fun begins. Genderqueer. this is the modern view which i didnt grow up with.

The Bugis have 5 genders. Surely we in America can have more. I grew up with the gendered soul... gender as an immutable mark upon the eternal self. And transexuals were stuck with bodies that didn't match the soul. Male and female He made them...

We didn't know that She made them. And She is a lot more playful.

I return endlessly to this question... Who am I?..Who would I be? Illness recently brought it back to me...When you are ill, and lacklustre then I felt that my feminine side was more challenged.. That is perhaps the lustre... but it is more that I am feminine with some people and more masculine with others... and illness cut me off from my normal weekend social life.. and it is harder to find Belinda.. in a coughing, sneezing.. mess in sweatpants.. than to find Bill. But we all end up coughing, sneezing.. and too lacklustre to suit up for saturday night, so what does that mean. Much of my life has been a journey from Bill to Belinda...If I am not making that journey and I have not arrived at Belinda.. then what?

So Is there a fair port called Genderqueer where weary mariners, their silks and satins in tatters can find refuge?

I can pretend so. I put on a dress or I put on a suit.. It is my choice... no? Not looking very butch in my drab..not fooling too many of them in my drag. There is a social world where I can be that. But what about in my heart, in my soul, in my loins?

Can you walk to two ways? Can you talk two ways? What about that soul? Is it gendered?

The androgyne... My hair is long. My body hairless. Small breasts... Thin not given to overly masculine demonstrations except for the occasional know it all asshole of course. The weekend, so my nails are painted but only in clear polish... I am home, and my clothes all came from the women's department, a skirt from a friend, a blouse that I have worn as a boy in NYC.. sort of a few flounces on a plain garment.

Doesn't a nomad need to wander, and every port is a place to go to, and to leave.

Halloween is coming.

What shall I wear?

tintinnabulation

Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells! Edgar Allen Poe

I haven't had a cigarette in six years, quitting with holiday bronchitis. Generally healthy since, but now I have been sick with respiratory infection for 7 weeks. And after 30+ years of smoking cigarettes, living through my father's tribulations with the wages of this particular vice, I felt a few times a sort of terror, and at least once I verged on an anxiety attack. Luckily my history of mental health is such that I recognized the condition, so I didn't march off to the ER.

Some seek the consolation of philosophy, but it is thin gruel. I prefer the consolations of religion, which for me is meditation, and the reaching out for the divine that I find there.

I wasn't terrified by death so much as by life; the invalid's life. How much of my life is frocking around with younger friends, making up for lost time, creating Belinda. How much of Belinda is dependent upon Eros. After all Belinda arose out of sexual fantasies and sexual desires. But when you are sick enough, there are no desires, only the desire to be well.

For me, throughout my life there have been intrusions, or manifestations. Events subject to interpretation. A sea aged plastic ornament red hearts connected by an arrow found on the beach on Mother's Day, a few years ago... and going way back... insects droning doom doom doom on a hot summer night and falling confused into conversation with my homosexual neighbor (married with kids, so quite a surprise) but that is a whole other story.

So with renewed religion, studying Goddess, Laksmii, Tripura Sundari, Devi... She of many names and modes of worship, there is sometimes, connection. There are the constants, ocean, birds, winds, the constituents of nature, or MAyA. Kinds of a feeling that it is all pretty good, pretty right. In fact I just wrote on the topic just a couple of monthes ago. Butterflies.

So in my battle with depression sleeping poorly ,waking early, I heard something, and I really couldn't place it. Finally I decided that it was sleigh bells... though we are short of snow and sleighs here in New Jersey this time of year. But later that morning, I was reading the Saundarya Lahari... the Flood of Beauty. Reading verse seven,

Kvanat kajci dama .. from the sound of Her belled and garlanded waist...

purostAd AstAm nah. ..... may she be in front of us...

Not all divinities are outfitted with girdles with bells, and I had certainly forgotten this detail, the Goddess manifest in a sound.

Synchronicities. Divine Coincidences. Some of us seem to need them, and blessedly we receive them. Anugraha... Grace. Small miracles which suggest rather than compel. I am never quite sure what to make of them, and not sure that I make of them what I should, which may be the same thing.

Definitely feeling much better now. Going out Saturday Night... returning to old habits, good and bad. Yet it is hard to deny that everything that you hold onto, clear thought,... Belinda.... goes.. and for me the terror wasn't the going, so much as being left behind... the shut-in. But that is for another time.

Nama Laksmii... Nama KAli

Sex Change Hospital

Not fully recovered from my illness, I spent a quiet night watching episodes of Sex Change Hospital. Like almost all TV shows, I wasn't aware this one existed, but once it turned up, I was shall we say in the demographic? Long ago, I knew a drag queen who taught me a lot, and always referred, mildly disapproving, to those sex changes...not the procedure... the people. So watching a number of those sex changes... (they actually show the procedures but blur them, like those private parts were in witness protection). I got to thinking.

Hearing those stories... it is a natural question In the demographic? the audience or the players? and while I have referred to my imaginary vagina, a real vagina is a whole other thing. I am more certain that I will not be on an episode bantering with Dr. Marcie Bower, about when I first realized I was a woman, my year of living as a woman complete, my coterie of shrinks proclaiming (or is it alleging) that I am not a psycho. Nor will I be in Thailand showing a wad of cash, and skipping all the rigamarole. But.... If I could snap my fingers, my wrist slightly limp, and voila... bye bye old friends, and hi new friend, then I certainly would do it. And go back to work the next morning... nobody the wiser.

But on the weekends ..Talk about accessorizing...

So does that make me a transexual. I think the obvious answer is yes. Does it mean that I am unfulfilled with my imaginary vagina? I don't think so. I just think that those genderqueer boyz and girlz are closer to the real then the well meaning doctors, and their sincere and hopeful patients. but then again I don't have a single letter that says I am not disturbed.

Shelter from the Storm

Out of commission for a few weeks with illness. And illness always brings to mind its old friend death. Not to be too melodramatic, but when you smoked cigarettes for 35 years, and then thought you dodged that bullet and the old smokers disease comes along bronchitis, and you can't get rid of it, then you need to see doctors, and who knows what they will say? So a chest X-ray, my first in probably 20 years or so. Like the young doctor said to me.. "who knows some people say if you want to stay healthy stay away from doctors" Amen brother. I dont just preach it. I live it. So showing my tits to a perfectly polite technician, and no one remarking about them. Are they invisible to the vanilla world? Or is everyone just ho hum these days. Anyway to my surprise the x-ray did not reveal imminent death though I sort of expected it. And so it was just a few weeks living the life of the infirm and convalescent.

Boo Hoo. Missed all my kinky birthday celebrations, though I had a perfectly lovely one as pater familas up in Maine on the family vacation. But the real topic is illness and gender right? Since the blog is everything and gender. Well, ill me is not particularly femme, Femme for me takes energy, enthusiasm, I need to feel something. Not just the hollow sloshing of my own effluvia. So I am almost well. My little friend the wren came visiting during the hurricane. I forced him back into the elements.
Its prevail or perish in any world I am familiar with. It looks like Belinda will prevail for a little while longer. Thanks heavens. I must have half a dozen outfits that are barely worn. Full moon on its way, and that means feeling femme, frisky and looking forward to tranny night in King of Prussia.

Ave atque vale.

Shoegasm

There are some advantages to femulation that I have only slowly come to understand. In male mode in the world, I am just another aging baby boomer, taking up space, listening to Deep Tracks on my radio, bitching about those young folks who have their heads up their ass. You know the type. But put me in a dress, respectfully doing my best to look and act effeminate, not passing usually with my stature too male, my voice too deep, but clearly a member of the third gender, transgender, not doing it on a dare or a prank, and all sorts of people notice you. Some may giggle or look askance but most smile, are friendly, talk to you, particularly women. And aren't they the most fun to talk to anyway?
Let me tell a story. I was recently at an event with a sweet submissive sissy friend, I was wielding a paddle in the middle of this large open space, which was filled with those of similar interests up to a variety of scenes. So who wanders into this place filled with the leather clad, and the barely clad, and of course the fabulously clad but a group of 5 or 6, dressed for the mall. Had they made some legendary wrong turn, and slipped by security standing agape at an ordinariness that defied understanding? Perhaps, or maybe they just knew someone in high places, who had promised them a spectacle.
Whatever the occasion, the youngest and prettiest separated from the group, a young woman on the right side of thirty, and approached me to speak, and instantaneously it was Margaret Meade in Samoa, if Ms Meade had been English. For she spoke in the British way. So she asked: Were we boys or girls? (Out of politeness I imagine) She was the soul of curiosity. What were we up to? why were we up to it? Offered an opportunity, she gave the sissy girl a couple of spanks on the bare bottom, a true participant observer.
Then she proceeded to tell me that she herself had a slight kink. She would go into her closet most mornings, put on a pair of too small shoes, and masturbate. She would have a nice cum, and then she was right for the rest of the day. We spoke a little more, and then she went on her merry way.
I assure you that girls young as my children do not normally describe their masturbatory habits when I am in drab. And if this information gets out, who knows there may be a trend for our tried and true males to put on the occasional frock and troll. I only hope they don't empty out the salvation armies.

"This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England" William Shakespeare

A case of miss-taken identity

"Genetic abnormalities such as gynandromorphy also occur from time to time. In addition many butterflies are infected by Wolbachia and infection by the bacteria can lead to the conversion of males into females"

Wikipedia Entry on Butterflies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly

Oh dear! I think I may have caught a touch of Wolbachia.

So the other morning a butterfly lands on my knee, and just sits for five minutes, ample time to get a few pictures with the camera phone.

But what does it mean?

Well ... it is said by those who study them that butterflies land on you because they need more salt than the nectar is supplying.

So if you have been involved in discussions with a dear Lady friend who wishes to become Herself authentically as a Domme, and if butterflies are caterpillars that decided to live authentically, then so what.

Would you see signs of divine communication in every rustle of a leaf?

Would you please step over here so that we can give you a few medications that may help?

Well .. actually I would, not the drugs, but I have seen the divine hand in the commonplace or the marvelous.

I am someone who awaits the divine communication, who has received the divine communication.

Who hungers for, and feels Devi's touch in the antics of sparrows, or dunlins.

The next weekend, I plan to go to a mall with my friend who seeks authenticity. She has promised to be brutally honest in describing how and where Belinda falls short of the ideal.

The ideal? Not to pass necessarily, since height and voice, and unalterable physical appearance can make that unlikely at best, but to strike the observor as feminine, in every surface detail, and at the bottom of my soul.

Now if the soul is gendered, then that is authenticity, but only the Catholics, Muslims, and a few others sects think that it is. In my heart of hearts I know that it is not.

How do I know?

A little birdy told me.

A Tale of Two Cities

I have been studying a little about programming blogs, so you must forgive me if I try a minor flourish in here. I have learned the hard way that this stuff is tricky






This is a tale of two cities, or rather two concerts in two cities, or rather two crowd watching two concerts in two cities. In October, I went to see Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, a three day free concert in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. This past weekend, I went to see Dave Matthew's Band Caravan, a three day concert in Atlantic City NJ, though I only went for one day. At the Atlantic City concert, I was older than maybe 1% of the crowd. At Golden Gate Park, I was right there among the beautiful people (or as you might say, the old people). And I couldn't help but wonder. Why at the one event and not the other. It wouldn't appear to be the city. After all AC, a casino town has a traditional codger demographic. It can't be the cost, as the young are usually the ones who can be priced out of events, So it is the music. But the music isn't really that different. DMB could easily play HSB and no one would raise an eyebrow. How is it different? Well none of the DMB Caravan bands played back in the hay day of the beautiful people, while HSB included Elvis Costello, Patti Smith, Emmy Lou Harris if you get the picture. Are my compadres stuck in the past clinging to the fragile memories of youth, or am I hopelessly chasing the illusion of actual youth. Or maybe living through the experience of listening to Bass Nectar has caused a subtle brain damage, and this sentence you read is the result.

Girls Just Want to Have Fun III

The picture was taken at a music festival this weekend, where there were tons of young people and one very affectionate female couple shown here. There was a mello vibe as these girls passionately kissed, but I couldn't help but feel this young and apparently very heterosexual crowd might have been more perturbed if the lovers were a pair of boys. But I leave that for my next post where I would like to describe the concert experience of one ancient hippy in a sea of the young and the restless.

In some previous posts, I was able to explore some issues near and dear to my heart, through an analysis of randomly sampled Fetlife profiles. I discovered among the participant in fetlife, that a lot of folks described themselves as switches, and a lot of folks describe themselves as bisexual.

>Part 1

Most surprising is while lots of males describe themselves as dominant, and lots of dominant males say that they are straight, Females are more varied in their descriptions. More of the gals describe themselves as bisexual than straight, and this is true even for submissive females.

Part II

Theres weren't enough transgendered people in random samples to really get a picture, so in order to get that picture, I looked at a popular group on fetlife, the genderblender group and sample transgendered people from there where they represent more than half of the thousands of group members. The table is seen below.

Most of the trangendered people were XY people, almost 70% as in the fetlife population as a whole. Almost 33% of those call themselves male, rather than one of the TG designations (MtF, genderqueer, etc) but the profile shows that they at least favor dressing girly. (In fact it is harder to tell if a female is transgendered, because these cues are less salient in the data.)





So here is the transgendered male breakdown.

	Dominant	Switch	Submissive
Straight	00%	11%	05%
Bisexual	02%	54%	25%
Homosexual	00%	00%	02%

So the overwhelming number of transgendered males describe themselves as bisexual (81%).

If the girls just want to have fun, the t-girls just wanna have more fun, and in their D/S preferences most are switches again, but they are more traditional females than the GG's, only 2% exclusively dominant.

The female sample was still small only 27. Ten of them were homosexual and none straight, so There is a signficant group of D/S lesbians on fetlife but D/S gay males are very rare.

The overall picture is pretty clear. The fetlife participants are not very traditional either in their D/S orientation or their sexual orientation. They like to experience the full range. Males and Females both span the D/S spectrum, and females , glorious females!! well they have come a long way baby. What all these numbers seem to indicate to me, I will leave to tomorrow's post when I tell the tale of my concert experience.

Discalced and Defrocked

There was a time when femininity was the cloak. Dark stockings hid hairy legs, and long satin blouses hid hairy arms, a hairy man become woman in simulacrum.

and then summertime, was the time to put away toys, and be one of the boys.

Then there was a time when masculinity was a cloak. Dark pants hide hairless legs and long dress shirts hide hairless arms and breasts and the effeminate becomes the masculine in simulacrum.

and then summertime. Shoes become sandals, and the flecks of red in hastily scrubbed nails are visible, and hairless legs and arms and rings and bracelets and long teased hair.

So what is the cloak, with closets full of skirts and shirts and blouses and pants, panties and y-fronts, and bras and stockings and socks. A corset makes a waist, and loose shirts hide breasts, and tight panties hide other things. But who is hidden and who remains in view?

in winter, the clothes are everything. boy clothes / girl clothes... in skirts you flirt.
Summer with so few clothes....

Thinking about a couple of days hanging out in an ashram or a zen monastery in mid-july. Almost always my genderification is defined by what I am doing and who I am spending time with. But this is a solo trip to do something I never do, so ... What should I wear? I mean it is spiritual renewal... What does one wear to enlightenment? frocks? socks? cloques? Nada?

And will I be in a dorm with men? I am planning to go to a sort of an ancient greek party this week. I have my peplos/tunic picked out, and it is not very different from a toga. And all the Eastern types are partial to robes as well... Maybe I can use that as my mantra as well as my mantle...
toga... toga... toga....toga....

Girls Just Wanna II

The last post gave the broad outlines that a substantial 30+ % of guys, and 60+%+ of girls! decline to describe themselves as straight among the profiles on fetlife. Transgender profiles that describe themselves as straight are even rarer. Breaking the numbers down into the D/S orientation does provide a little more information. Here are the percentages of each D/S category that call themselves straight for males and females. See below. I need a different data collection method for transgender people, so I leave that for another posting.

	Dominant	Switch	Submissive
Female	32%	24%	41%
TransGender	--%	--%	--%
Male	82%	59%	60%

The most heterosexual group of any is dominant males with 82% describing themselves that way. Those males who do not occupy the traditional male dom role, are less likely to describe their orientation as straight. Similarly the female group with the largest straight representation is the submissive females. Another way to put this is that DS switches or those who occupy the less traditional D/S roles, are also more likely to be heteroflexible, bisexual, or homosexual. And women in general are more likely to be "flexible in their sexual orientation.

I confess that I am less knowledgeable about bisexuality than I should be, so I am going to return to the topic after I digest some of what is on the internet. Turns out there is tons. Like this website



http://people.ucalgary.ca/~ptrembla/gay-lesbian-bisexual/6g-bisexual-resources.htm


Another thing I promise to do is to stop making such horrible tables. That is a matter of learning a little HTML, which for this old dog is a new trick. Once I learn it though there are going to be lots and lots of pretty tables. in sans-serif or perhaps courier, and if the information is too scandalous, I will code it in dingbats so only adults can figure it out. At the least no giant spaces, and horrible unreadable colors.


Anyway next post is back to my personal broodings which are as ever world shaking and festering. Shall I pierce my ears? Shall I spend a small fortune on a corset and vibrator? or save the dough and retreat for some days to an ashram? I don't think I can do both, I think that they frown on the constant.. buzz.... oh! buzz .....oh! in the spartan accomodations of the ashram. But corsets! Well that's another story. I think that fall clearly under the category "austerities" , and a lot sexier than a needle through the cheek. (for some of us)

Girls Just Want to Have Fun

In the last post, research on fetlife, had revealed a large number (37%) of the profiles described themselves as somewhere in the middle on the dominance/ submission axis, switches to some extent or another. These data were easily collected because the profiles themselves didn't need to be examined, just the thumbnail to the profiles. This week I want to describe some additional findings I acquired from examination of information contained in the profiles themselves. In the next post I will describe the results in detail, but here I just want to describe the most striking result. In the profiles people list their sexual orientation. The choices come from a pull down menu. One choice is straight, and then there are a number of more or less crooked choices. They include some mild deviations from strict heterosexuality, (heteroflexible, fluctuating / evolving) some clear bisexual choices ( bisexual, pansexual) and some homosexual indications ( gay).

So how many of the guys describe themselves as straight? 69% of our survey respondents did so. That means 31% did not, and only a few of those described themselves as gay, so it is a fairly substantial number of bi or heteroflexible gentlemen, much larger than the proportion that describe themselves that way in the general population, where the reports are in the low single digits.

http://www.kinseyinstitute.org/resources/FAQ.html

But how about the girls? Well I hesitate to give the answer lest I be accused of besmirching the reputation of womanhood. Because the way I count it, only 34% of women on fetlife describe themselves as straight! 66% swing some other way, or at least are interested in doing so. Contact the American Family Association, we may have a problem. The Ladies appear to be coming across that ocean of girl on girl porn that the guys so love, and are liking what they see. At any rate, I had no idea. And the transex people, well transsex people who describe themselves as straight are an endangered species coming in at 10%. and I didn't even sample my own profile!!. So what gives? I will provide more info in my next post.

.

A sub is just a roll

Or is that a role. Why are some individuals committed to one role, while others are flexible?
I have been thinking about how I might contribute to the sum of knowledge through my blog entries ......beyond helping readers to understand that there is one more self involved asshole blogging happily away.

This is the first of a series of posts, which sampled profiles on fetlife to find some interesting things about gender, dominance and sexuality.  The other posts which followed  are  Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Part 1   Part 2    and    Part 3

Thinking about the malleability of gender and power roles. We grow up thinking that it is decreed, but I am learning that this is perhaps delusion. I originally was ready to proclaim the wisdom of my own insights into the psychology of gender bending and power relationships in the communities that I have come to know. Then I realized that in another life I function as a scientist, and that this topic is subject to some basic empirical research. So I present a bit of research I did which I hope some will find interesting. I basically developed a method by which I could randomly search profiles on Fetlife, the facebook of kink, and simply note the declared gender and preferred power status of the user. I did this about 350 times, and created the chart below. Gender-wise users can describe themselves as male or female or a variety of ambi-gendered descriptions. In the same way they can describe themselve with unambiguous power designations master, dom, domme or submissive, slave, bottom, or ambiguous terms like switch or kinkster, or sadomasochist, all of which I lumped into switch.
The results are shown below.

	Dominant	Switch	Submissive
Female	04%	11%	12%
Ambi-Gender	0%	01%	02%
Male	29%	25%	14%

.HTML Tables

Not Surprising. Almost 70% of profiles describe themselves as male while only 27% say they are female. I think that past research in this area has shown that males self describe as being into BDSM relationships at least twice as often as females.
Sorry Guys!

Where were my assumptions shattered? Well I imagined that close to 25% would describe themselves in gender ambiguous terms. Hey all my friends do!!
3%! alas! And I was ready to do my riff on how power preferences are malleable,but I thought only 20%- would self-describe as the old switcheroo, but it turned out to be 37%. More than chose the old tried and true male dom, female sub categories. So hush my mouth! I am abashed and educated. Gender is still a relatively inflexible category, but top/bottom preferences are much more fluid in the early 21st century, and that in itself is a sign of progressive understanding of gender. In traditional world, gender and power are fixed and inflexible. That so many do not fall into the stereotypical male /female power dynamics is a sign that this world is far behind us.
I think simple examination of the demographics of Fetlife may provide some other insights into the relative flexibility of gender and power. If I can only pause long enough in the continuing self examination to look at it.

End of Days

Hello

Have you come here, googling or whatever you call it in your time, convinced of end times, and looking for information? Welcome! I lived in end times, and it looks like you do too. You say i couldn't have lived in end times? because you are still wandering around looking for the signs? Well that is a very limited viewpoint, and I am here to tell you why.

In the final days, the divine will call the blessed to be at Her side, and the damned? well it will be strife and struggle on a godless planet until finally the curtain is lowered and the show is over.

I lived in New Jersey and our prophets told of the rapture since my youth. "Goodbye New Jersey I have become airborne" to quote one. But Goddess is everywhere, and in everything and the beatific vision, salokya is here and it is now. So are you in heaven? No. Well then it is simple, you are struggling mightily on a planet with no trace of the divine?

Is that the case? Sorry honey Judgement Day!

I wish I could help you out, but I have passed beyond your ken. If there is still a New Jersey, and you are still in it. I recommend a visit to the big blue hole.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Hole_(New_Jersey)

The Sweet Bi and Bye

"We do as we please from morning til the end of the day" Ray Davies

Hail Protean players. Secret life livers, and Second Life subscribers, the negotiators of dual existences, trilifes, and quadentities. Fashion the meat puppet as required, and program the mind puppet accordingly.

Overturn the monolith of the monolife monotony.

Ah didn't that feel better.

In the hindu mythology there are the rakshasa's, the kAmarupas who can assume any form, like Odo in Deep Space Nine, only not so pleasant as they are fond of devouring humans, and acquire all the bad press that seems to accompany this culinary choice. Calumny I swear. Merely the normal preference of higher life forms for lower. Burger anyone?

But really my point is that we live under conditions of identity, and self fulfillment. Did someone say "Be all you can be?" And what would that be? Well let's check out match.com. "I am a male of a certain age. I am a corporate professional, I dress nice. My interests are swatting flies, flying planes, planing boards etc. " So unremarkable as to elude remark. What is simpler. We are, and therefore we are someone and someone is male of a certain age. etc. etc. We aspire to identities, and cling to them from childhood to senescence, awaiting their rapture or ruin finally.

Then the late model tranny is a male who comes to realize his female gender identity... out with the old and in with the new. But then the how do you deal with all those who were fond of the old or called the old daddy, or bastard. Well fret and worry is always a strategy.

But what if it is mostly a crock. A story we tell each other over and over ad nauseum.

KAmarupas of the world unite. We have nothing to lose but our pain.

From Here to Eternity

Recently I heard that the novel From Here to Eternity had been censored to remove references to homosexuality. this struck a chord because From Here to Eternity was my father's favorite book. At first I thought "so there!" speaking as it were from here to Eternity where he resides, but I understand that Prewitt, the character he most admired would not engage in homosexual acts for money. And anyway, the only really interesting communications would be from Eternity to here. But it did serve to remind me that the forces that shaped me, shaped my father. He confessed that his mother had dressed him funny, (knickers in his day), and he had a deep concern with masculinity growing up in a fatherless home. He certainly communicated that to me. I knew that revealing my fascination with femme clothing would have been very troubling for him, and probably trouble for me. Our biggest mistake together, a drunken prelude to an almost fist fight broken up by my mother, was precipitated by his voicing sympathy with my persecutors because I was wearing "fruit boots" ( sort of Uggs).

It was the time of "Are you a boy or are you a girl?" gender relaxation and the sometimes violent reaction to such. But all the boys were doing such things, so a special boy like me could certainly slide there,and I didn't regard my gender relaxed hair, and colorful cloths as particularly revelatory of my deeper secrets. But now what would he say to his hormone soaked, closet full of drag, semi-public sissy of a son, who was already something of a disappointment?

Well if he has been absorbed back into the unmanifest Brahma; If he has seen the play of male and female in the realms of the Devas and Devi, then he may have a gentle comment.

"Are you the last creature on earth who still wears slips?" and he might appreciate that in my way I emulated his dilemma, choosing masculinity for my public persona, and living all of my significant life up to a few years ago as a man. I certainly don't know very well the demons that may have afflicted that very stoic man who provided me with the proper role model which he never had from his own absent, arrogant and morally questionable father. I found a heart ornament from my mother on a lonely beach a few Easter's ago. I have not had such obvious communications from his Eternity. But the connections were so much more strained,. Anyway I am glad that Prewitt did not turn out to be effeminate, and censored. We each have our blessings and our burdens. My father was a model among men. I see his karma at work still and still doing good in my brother particularly another model among men. Me? I have chosen a different path or it chose me.

I Remember You

I remember vividly and still feel it, mostly vicariously, the thrill.. pitter pat.. of a boy's heart when he regards that which is soft, and sensuous, gentle and admiring, curvy and complete in a body that hurts to look at, eyes that hurt to look into... a voice that.. melts.... Mom's register, the female voice. The heart swells.... and that isn't the only thing that swells. Those special memories; just so tickled to have a sweet smelling, good looking girl on your arms or in your arms. To be the rather colorless consort to that gay colorful lilting creature!

So when you begin to seriously emulate her. When you dress as you never dressed as young. A flowing skirt, a lighter tread, sparkles from a little costume bling, and the lovely feelings of your beautful underthings, soft against your body. When you are her if only approximately, and with a few more years on you than she had, when you are her nonetheless, a experience the other side, there is a loss. She laughed, and lilted and flirted with that colorless shy boy, and that boy.... well.... that boy is gone.

It has been very satisfying for me to be transgendered, but like serial monogamy is not polyamoury so serial gender identification is not the full experience, but I am not sure with my hormones, and my sweety titties that I would never never want to surrender, that I could ever have that full experience. Some people, younger than i call themselves genderqueer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genderqueer

I would love to know if someone can actually be both ... male and female in some fundamental way and enjoy both pieces of the dance. In the same day, in the same body.... The mystical union...

Or didn't you know. Yab Yum is Yum Yum.

Pheromones Again

A couple of years ago, I was wondering how estrogen might change the way I smell, and whether that would cause otherwise heterosexual men to be attracted to me.

http://harmonybelle.blogspot.com/2009/12/full-moons-pheromones-and-i-phones.html Well it was sort of a weekend of philosophical discussion and t-group sort of activity this weekend, and a post op T-Girl who has been married was asked by a woman who was curious why She used to be attracted to girls, and was now attracted to men. And what the postop girl said was .... "well men just started to smell good" Things that make you go HMMM... or is that HUM! the night before discussion was about knowing yourself, and how it isn't about you, and other things that sound good, but I always wonder.. like " Is everyone having me on?" Be honest about what you want..etc etc.. I mean I think I want to get up now and get another beer, but beyond that.. like whether I want boys or girls.. or maybe just lots of mirrors... well I don't really know. But I do know that my sissy girlfriend who is after all a boy... well She smells wonderful, and I love to ..well I love to smell her. and that means I love to smell him... and that means... gasp! oh double gasp!! I like boys... cause I actually like to touch her where she isn't a her , and smell her.. and in the morning touching her and making her swell.. and the strong unshowered morning smell of her.. and I can only say that the whole experience is just swell. In evening contemplation, enjoying the lime wafting from my my beer. I can entertain the possibility that it all sounds awfully homosexual of me, and I just looked up late onset homosexuality, and they mean like 20 or something, so that is definitely an F in the Introductory Know Yourself. But I forgot... I take hormones! and while Girls still smell great, now boys smell great too, and could it be just that simple... Better Living Through Chemistry. And now I am thinking with this essay I may just be able to cajol the professor into giving me a C-

OBLIVIOUS

Now that is a condition that I have been accused of embracing and it would explain alot. After all it is reasonable to ask someone to get their sexual preferences straight (or not) before they slip into a senescent state. I am not sure that I am going to make it however. Dont Ask? Don't Tell? How about Don't Know. I have enjoyed the company of t-girls mostly the last couple of years. And t-girls are generally somewhere between boys and girls and some, when they take their clothes off are more boys than girls. It has been a great revelation to me since I started dressing more publically that right from day one, i was willing to be intimate with t-girls, and over time the great revelation has been that I dont mind the boy in the girl. This weekend at a bar hanging out with a friend. We were talking with a gay man my age, about t-girls and what our sexuality was. I was trying to explain that it was complicated. He had a simple rule for gay. He asked what was the last time you sucked cock. well... darn... what a question... 3 hours I said.. and that seemed to take care of the complexities for him. He appeared to be oblivious to the subtleties.

Oblivious.... I have also begun to wonder about forgetting. I find myself increasingly forgetful mostly about names... and names... well I was always oblivious... only now do I have the social smarts to realize that is makes sense to make a point of remembering names... People like when you remember their name. If you live long enough, and get far enough away from your youth, you realize that a whole bunch of it is forgotten or never thought of. Where do those summer days of baseball, and ring alevio and monopoly go when they are never thought of, and when thought of.. how have they all merged into an indistinct something. Imagine if we lived 10 or 100 times longer than we do. Would we essentially be totally disconnected from childhood, unable to remember the least thing? Or is it all lurking there.. (where?) waiting for that silly little sliver of moving consciousness we call ME. to get around to visiting.

Now this gentleman spent a lot of time thinking about the problem.

Buddhism in my understanding says let it go... let everything go... the problem is clinging.. holding on. Oblivion is the great ocean of the eternal.

Jump honey... Mama will catch you. Unless I forget there should be a part two.

You can't blame us

" We didn't know who we were til we got here. We thought we were something else"

Robert Stone in Dog Soldiers

As a heterosexual man with a bit of a fetish for girls stuff, when I go to bed at night and remove my clothes including my girl stuff, and find myself hugging my diminutive but nonetheless very real breasts, and missing my latest bed companion who in the last couple of years has always revealed a little something extra underneath when she takes down her panties. I gotta say to Mr Stone... Wow... too true!

He was talking about Vietnam and unpleasant revelations of self. Me .. well.. I am not so horrified by what I have become so much as .... chagrined. I mean Whats up with that? It's one thing to always be the last to know, when we are talking about where the party is. But to be so ... shall we say mis-informed about one's true self... well that can be a little chagrin-ing.

I recently was delighted to see that Bea, the Raymond Chandler of feminization fantasies has begun a blog, and re-established a central place for her stories.

I am of the age and type where stories.. vividly rendered sexual fantasies, were important in satisfying the needs that remained unfulfilled when i pursued my normal boy loves girl dating life. Miss Bea didn't write those stories like Miss High Heels! but later when I came upon her wonderful stories I found myself returning to them again and again... A vivid fantasy reveals something of who we are I suppose, and so those stories of males..slowly but inevitably feminized by wonderful dominant Women were mirrors to reveal to me a hungry boy with aching loins looking at a dim refliection of what? Or perhaps I am just going on as I will.

For sissy boys like me, those stories were hot hot hot.

But don't take my word for it. If your taste runs to forced fem, well put on a clean pair of panties and maybe a pad dear.

http://magselectronics.com/

Try Maid Machiavelli. Imagine if you were David! Would his delicious fate be your own?

Or are you something else?