I'm rather fond of a lot of the stories here, mainly the ones that are more or less real life (okay, with a certain amount of suspension of disbelief.) I have downloaded a number of them so I can read and reread them when I need comfort. (I've OD'ed on chocolate to the point that my stomach no longer tolerates it, so these stories are the next best thing.)

But I've noticed that the view of what is involved in being a woman that I see in these stories is very different from the life I'm leading, now that I've transitioned (full-time for 2 1/2 years, so far.) In the stories, becoming a girl or a woman seems to involve make-up, pierced earrings, painted nails (or even glued-on "nails"), high heels, short skirts and short dresses, pantyhose (=sheer tights for you non-USAers), salon visits for fancy hair-dos, removing all body hair, and "Girl 101" -- lessons in how to talk, how to walk, how to move, and Ghod knows what else.

However, in my life now, I manage less than half that list.

I do wear pierced earrings whenever I go out and often even at home, mostly because I like how it looks.

I wear dresses almost exclusively, because they're more comfortable than trousers or skirts, but mid-calf length, because I don't like sitting with bare skin on the seat when on a subway or train. (I actually prefer even longer skirts, but I've found I tend to step on them going up stairs or even rolling my office chair over them. I've torn a few that way.) I guess shorter skirts are supposed to be sexy, but at my age, I think I'd just look stupid. My body has always been something I wanted to hide, and even more so now that I'm old. (Besides, the last thing I want to do is attract men.)

I tried nail polish, but I found it takes something like an hour to put it on and wait for it to dry, and I just don't have the spare time to splurge that way.

High heels? With my feet and my weight, impossible. Besides, I've never found them attractive. I have a pair of pumps with slight (1.5 inch) heels, and I simply can't walk any distance in them. And anyway, most of the women I know can't stand them, either. There's also the fact that there's not a lot of selection in women's (US) size 14 shoes. I've only found one (on-line) place that carries any at all.

Hair-dos? I'd need to actually have a head of hair. I make do with a wig.

Make-up? I've been trying a few things, but I'm 65, my face looks like 10 miles of bad road, and there's not much that make-up can do to hide that. I make do with foundation to make me look like a life-long alcoholic, and I sometimes try mascara (but it isn't working out well at all.) I put it on when I go into the office (roughly twice a week), just to get in practice. Also, I have the feeling that most of the women I hang out with don't do make-up much, either. (My ex never used make-up the entire time we were married.)

And "Girl 101"? I was actually in a class which was trying to teach us how to walk and even how to sneeze (!) But when I observed women and men in real life (I used to walk along 42nd street to and from my old office), although they didn't all walk alike, I didn't see that women were walking different from men. I've been trying to pitch my voice higher (I can easily reach C above middle C when I sing), but if I'm involved in what I'm saying, I usually forget.

In fact, in my life now, aside from the clothes I wear and the wig, I'm not doing things much different from the way I did when I was living as a man. And to be honest, I can't say that I really want to. I still can't figure out why it feels so much better to be living as a woman, since I haven't changed all that much.

And then there's the problem that a lot of these expectations collide with my feminist sensibilities: if I believe that these rules are nothing but Patriarchy's oppression and that cis women shouldn't have to do any of this stuff (which I do believe), why would I try to do any of it, especially if I don't feel like it? I can't remember a time when I wasn't rebelling against gendered expectations, and I suspect that if I'd been AFAB, I'd have been rebelling, too, just against different expectations. Now that I've clawed my way out of a cramped, stifling gender-box, do I really want to jump into another one?

So sometimes I wonder: am I doing it all wrong? Am I failing at being a Real Trannie^TM? (I've spent my life not being able to Do It Right, no matter what "It" is.) And does my lack of any gender identity (heck, I don't even understand what a "gender identity" is) fit in there anywhere? Maybe I'm not really trans, but just weird. I mean, people have called me that (and worse) ever since I was a small child, maybe they're right. Is being a failure at being cis sufficient to be trans?

Oh, and am I being a bad feminist by doing the femme things that I do do?

Inquiring minds want to know (especially at 3 a.m. when I can't get back to sleep for questioning.)

(P.S.: putting on a bra: lots of stories say, hook the clasps with the bra around backwards and then slide it around. Does not work for me -- the band won't slide for love or money. Another failure! But I am developing a certain amount of flexibility, though, from trying to get my arms around my back to hook the clasps.)